The Starling Girl, 2023.
Written and Directed by Laurel Parmet
Starring Eliza Scanlen, Lewis Pullman, Wrenn Schmidt, Jimmi Simpson, Claire Elizabeth Green, Austin Abrams, Chris Dinner, Paige Leigh Landers, Kieran Sitawi, Jessamine Burgum, Kyle Secor, Andrew Riley Stephens, and K.J. Baker
SYNOPSIS:
17-year-old Jem Starling struggles with her place within her Christian fundamentalist community. But everything changes when her magnetic youth pastor Owen returns to their church.
In writer/director Laurel Parmet’s debut narrative feature, The Starling Girl, strict Christian values through even stricter upbringings almost feel designed to mold teenage girls on the cusp of adulthood into easy prey for older men, furthering that impulse to make bold and questionable life choices in the face of searching for identity, since the surrounding environments are prohibiting the girl from doing so in a healthy manner.
This feels like a deeply personal film where much of what’s depicted is coming from some area of experience, with Eliza Scanlen (no stranger to playing characters ending up in sketchy relationships with older men) as the titular Jem Starling trying to explore sexual curiosity in a local Kentucky community where everyone insists indulging in those lustful feelings equates to letting the devil inside the body, and that women are basically here to serve men.
Jem is a part of the church’s dance troupe (captured with graceful poetry), where the movements are nitpicked in practice to ensure that there are not even traces of sexually suggestive motions and that the performance remains focused on pleasing God (something about that being the purpose for girls dancing is gross in itself, especially how nonchalantly adults express that meaning). She also seems to be regularly resisting the temptation to masturbate at night. Meanwhile, her ultra-religious parents, Paul and Heidi (Jimmi Simpson and Wrenn Schmidt), are already looking into setting up an arranged marriage for the 17-year-old with a similarly aged preacher’s son.
So when handsome youth pastor Owen (Lewis Pullman) returns from an out-of-country mission trip, seemingly more laid-back and less concerned with the rules (one of the group’s first exercises upon returning is along the lines of meditation), she develops an attraction that he takes advantage of as a reprieve from his fractured marriage. It’s also uncomfortable watching The Starling Girl considering while viewers want Jem to have agency and the freedom to explore her sexuality without shame and is technically getting to do so with Owen, it is opening the doors to a different kind of abuse. That’s also what separates The Starling Girl apart from recent films in this trend of exploring icky age-gap sexual relationships; Jem is finding a sense of liberation but not in a healthy way.
There is also a subplot involving Jem’s father, as a once upon a time musician who gave up that lifestyle and found God to raise a family but is also severely depressed as he sneaks away at night to listen to his old songs. Aspects of this parallel storyline feel rushed, leading to an ending that feels a bit overwritten, cliché, and unearned. The narrative follows the template one probably expects, although it is dramatically engaging, especially as it is evident that some arranged marriages on display are somewhat broken and typically contain someone using their private time to break traditions and rules.
However, Eliza Scanlen delivers a terrific vulnerable, timid performance as a girl who simply wants to feed her sexual curiosities and enjoy the pleasures of life without placing God or another man above her happiness. She also generates reasonable chemistry with Lewis Pullman, although the choice to cast someone so Hollywood-beautiful is a cheap route to setting up the initial lust. The hardcore Christian angle baked into The Starling Girl, alongside those compelling performances, is enough to give this enough of a unique slant for this familiar storytelling ground.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews, follow my Twitter or Letterboxd, or email me at MetalGearSolid719@gmail.com
