Christine "Lady Bird" McPherson (Saoirse Ronan) is a high school senior from the "wrong side of the tracks". She longs for adventure, sophistication, and opportunity, but finds none of that in her Sacramento Catholic high school. This movie follows the title character's senior year in high school, including her first romance, her participation in the school play, and most importantly, her applying for college.Written by
Dehlia
The book that Kyle, and later Lady Bird, was reading is "A People's History of the United States" by Howard Zinn. See more »
Goofs
When Lady Bird first meets Kyle he is sitting on a car with a license plate that starts with a 6. A 6 was not used as a first letter on California license plates until 2007. See more »
SHOWN AT THE BEGINNING: "Anybody who talks about California hedonism has never spent a Christmas in Sacramento." -Joan Didion See more »
Alternate Versions
In India, the film was released in two separate versions; one classified at A while the other classified at U/A. The A-rated version of the film is for the most part identical to the original uncut version of the film however with anti-smoking advertisements placed at the beginning and middle of the film and stronger language ('c**t', 'dick', 'penis' and 'tits') being muted on all occasions. The U/A version of the film was later released with heavier reductions made. Along with the original changes made for the A rating the distributor also removed and muted out dialogue deemed to strong for the U/A rating (references to sperm, virginity, a scene in which a woman tells someone to 'suck a dick' and school girls discussing sex in a classroom were all either muted or removed). The sex scene between Kyle and Lady Bird was removed along with sight of a woman underwater in swimming gear; two shots of kissing were also removed. This edited version of the film (which runs around seven minutes shorter) was then re-released in India later with a U/A rating. See more »
The greatest thing about this film is its balance. It's funny, it's touching, it's emotional and it's heartfelt. Some scenes will make you laugh out loud, others will make you shiver and some will make you feel happy. Every emotion is perfectly measured out. Not one single scene is overdone or melodramatic.
The theme of the film is classic: growing up. Christine is seventeen and she wants to be different. That's why she calls herself Lady Bird. She lives in Sacramento ('The Midwest of California') and she hates it. That's why she wants to move to the East Coast ('where there is culture'). She attends a high school run by nuns called Immaculate Heart, but she feels she doesn't belong there. That's why she applies for Ivy League universities, defying advice and common sense.
All the coming-of-age ingredients are there: the longing for greater things (already in one of the very first scenes), the parents who have forgotten what it's like to be a teenager (one parent in particular, in this case), the joy of turning eighteen, the urge to get away from home.... and I could go on.
Because all this has already been done so many times on the big screen, it's difficult to stand out. But director Greta Gerwig has managed just that. Not by adding anything special to the mix of familiar themes, but by showing them just as they are. And by applying the perfect mix of a laugh, a tear, a shiver and some goosebumps.
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The greatest thing about this film is its balance. It's funny, it's touching, it's emotional and it's heartfelt. Some scenes will make you laugh out loud, others will make you shiver and some will make you feel happy. Every emotion is perfectly measured out. Not one single scene is overdone or melodramatic.
The theme of the film is classic: growing up. Christine is seventeen and she wants to be different. That's why she calls herself Lady Bird. She lives in Sacramento ('The Midwest of California') and she hates it. That's why she wants to move to the East Coast ('where there is culture'). She attends a high school run by nuns called Immaculate Heart, but she feels she doesn't belong there. That's why she applies for Ivy League universities, defying advice and common sense.
All the coming-of-age ingredients are there: the longing for greater things (already in one of the very first scenes), the parents who have forgotten what it's like to be a teenager (one parent in particular, in this case), the joy of turning eighteen, the urge to get away from home.... and I could go on.
Because all this has already been done so many times on the big screen, it's difficult to stand out. But director Greta Gerwig has managed just that. Not by adding anything special to the mix of familiar themes, but by showing them just as they are. And by applying the perfect mix of a laugh, a tear, a shiver and some goosebumps.