Support the Girls

2018’s Support the Girls, written and directed by Andrew Bujalski.

Starring Regina Hall, Haley Lu Richardson, Shayna McHayle, James Le Gros, Lea DeLaria, Jana Kramer, and AJ Michalka.

What is it about?

Set in present day America,  a group of ladies work at a “Hooters”-like family restaurant called, “Double Whammys”. Lead by their manager, Lisa (Regina Hall), the girls such as Maci (Haley Lu Richardson), and Danyelle (Shayna McHayle), work at their jobs, managing sexist comments and eager-to-touch gestures from customers, all while they try to keep their lives together. Lisa takes on a lot of the younger girls’ drama, operating as a mentor figure to them. This approach contrasts poorly with the struggling establishment’s owner, Cubby (James Le Gros), who feels his employees are expendable and that Lisa has poor boundaries. Lisa is struggling with her personal life at the same time- will she be able to hold it together in the economic environment of America today?

Why is it worth seeing?

Support the Girls is a character study about a group of people who form a community through their employment. It features fantastic performances from its cast, and is a very patient and spontaneous film that is underrated.

There really is no justice in the world. Regina Hall’s last film, Girls’ Trip, grossed a boat load of money- and will be a strong contender for my least favourite film of this year. Meanwhile, Support the Girls, with an 85 score on Metacritic, appears to have covered its catering budget with its box office gross. It’s an interesting parallel to the underlying tone of the film- that of intelligent, good hearted, and professionally capable people desperately clinging to bare bones survival in early 21^st century America. Their reward seems to be scrutiny from their mistrusting employer- and a grateful wave to the employer down the street offering “competitive wages”. 

As noted, Regina Hall is wonderful here, warmly portraying someone who wants to do a good job for her employer, wants to be strong, fair, and fun towards her employees, who wants so badly to be a role model for women and an advocate to all. She’s tough- but not made of stone, and there’s even a wonderful moment of her expressing herself honestly to a uninvolved presence. Right beside her, is Haley Lu Richardson (so good already in The Edge of Seventeen, and particularly, Columbus), as a poster child for good natured but naïve optimism, who may be smarter than her scantily clad character lets on. Acting as a sombre wake up call to both of them, is the perpetually reasonable and dreary underdog of Shayna McHayle, who seems to get as little satisfaction from her job as she does camaraderie from the majority of her 20 year old drama filled coworkers.

Writer director Andrew Bujalski does a great job of creating a home away from home, with the practically lived in environment of the sad themed restaurant that isn’t too far off from closing for good, and the coworkers that can be tighter than some families. There’s the regular guest that wants to fight obnoxious customers out in the parking lot, or the sad old man a waitress takes a little too much interest in, or even an employee who has a zen moment by the dumpster in the back when briefly away from the chaos of it all. As a former service industry worker, it rings very true.

Bujalski’s comparisons to directors like Mike Leigh are appropriate, as he dives right in to his character’s lives for some serious qualitative study that is both quietly beautiful- and downright ugly at times. Through it all, there are no easy fixes given, it’s all tough choices we are obligated to make, and the film’s ending has the faith in its audience’s intelligence to work out resolutions to the challenges presented here.

Filled with solid performances and true to life studies of its characters, Supporting the Girls is deserving of more attention- it would be nice if its stars didn’t have to practically strip naked on top of a bar to get it. Bujalski’s intimate look at characters struggling to get by is worth noticing- for a guy who created the so called mumblecore movement, his latest feature really can scream with a conviction that it is worth noticing.

Rating:

4/5

Trailer: Click Here.