I can't give Lady Bird a 10. The acting and script is excellent and I love the setting. The Catholic school is quirky and fun and the year 2002-2003 is a great year for the conversations they have about 9/11 and the war. But the film sometimes feels artificial and don't make me explain why I feel that way. It's also dream-like and fast moving when I feel it could have slowed down and gotten a less quirky tone. Overall the best parts are when the daughter and mom are talking and the scenes of Lady Bird hanging out with her theater friends it's breathtaking how well those scenes are portrayed. 9/10 has some slow moments that could have been trimmed and some short moments that could have been lengthened.

Well done, well acted, good script, an enjoyment of entertainment.

Saoirse Ronan must have some powerful friends determined to get her an Oscar. No offense to the young woman who is beautiful and talented but first the lightweight "Brooklyn" was thrust upon the masses and now the vapid "LBJ". I cannot be the only one who sees this.

When Christine McPherson, or Lady Bird as she prefers to be called, discovers she has been accepted into Public Ivy UC Davis, she curls her lip in disgust; it's a mere thirty minutes away, when really she dreams leaving her nest and flying away to the Big Apple, or at the very least Connecticut. Her entire existence serves as an affront to the modest Sacramento, her style a personal rebellion. The only thing pinker than her streaked hair or prom dress is the cast she sports after flinging herself out of the car mid-argument in the opening vignette, in protest of her mother's parental suffocation. It's a wonderful scene of conflicting perspectives and overlapping dialogue, all timed to perfection by a mother and daughter each trying to get their own word in.It helps that Saoirse Ronan is capable of tuning into any frequency that the film calls for. In truth, she's better coy than cutting and sardonic anyway, as if you feel a huge weight lift off her shoulders in the quieter moments where she isn't keeping up the facade. When she's in the classroom trying to impress the 'cool' girls, her neck is craned forward and her eyes dart around to make sure everyone is hearing and seeing this. But watch her fumble through an approach to a potential crush (both times) and you see the self-consciousness cascade from inside her, and it feels real.In many instances it is the dialogue's authenticity that shines through, juggling the messy and often hilarious contradictions of a teenager's mind: Lady Bird and her best friend Julie throw dirty looks and scoff at the popular Jenna's petrol-guzzling land rover, only to rapidly switch tack and gush at how pretty she is. Later they are lying on their backs with legs up on the wall, munching on communion wafers ("They're not consecrated.") and barely holding in their laughter as they compare their delicate usage of shower handles. The camera zeroes in on this odd little vignette through an upside-down overhead shot, and it is the perfect encapsulation of the film's milieu, a lull in the day of a small-town Catholic school for two girls who only dream of graduation and beyond, and must meanwhile entertain themselves. Lady Bird fends off her micromanaging mum, all the while crossing paths with the usual caricatures, although Gerwig tries her best to sidestep expectations. Amongst them is queen bee Jenna (who's cooler than we expect, and plainer in her ambitions - not that there's anything wrong with that), first crush Danny who is eventually revealed to be gay, and second crush Kyle, who flirts the line between hilarious and infuriating with his constant posturing. The intention behind the mockery is to highlight the hypocrisy of the upper middle class, but Gerwig makes him too easy a punching bag, constantly sporting a cigarette (hand-rolled, naturally) and a Howard Zinn book but not a cellphone (although he whips one out to make detour before prom, further drawing attention to his phoniness). Then again, isn't he exactly the dreamy type that Lady Bird would fall for, only to look back on as Christine and groan as the audience does?Lady Bird believes she has already outgrown Sacramento, and merely asks for the room to spread her wings, but her mother, in a searing performance by Laurie Metcalf, only asks for her to be considerate. Neither are entirely in the wrong. The film's journey is an exercise in empathy building, for two women to slowly but surely see the other's perspective, like how she confronts Danny with a hostile expression but ends up as a shoulder to cry on. Or, after an underwhelming first time, the camera pauses to consider Kyle's father, who has worked his whole life to ensure that his child has a future to look forward to, and is now wasting away. Eventually, one must let go of her fear, and the other, her anger. Standing in New York, the centre of the world, she considers Sacramento.