If you are a cheapskate freeloader like me, Spotify frequently interrupts your 90s R&B jam sesh with some annoying ads hawking this product or that service. Most annoying of all? The back-and-forth breathy giggles of Ari Graynor and Lauren Miller as they hype their new movie, For a Good Time Call. It’s about phone sex, you guys, so you know it’s going to be edgy and hip.
As I am the definition of edgy and hip (on edge and wide of hip?), I took Graynor and Miller up on their invitation and by golly, a good time was had by all.
Top 5 Things to Like About For a Good Time Call
1. For us, by us: You know what is definitively better than old men talking about women’s vaginas (looking at you, GOP…), young women talking about vaginas! You know why? They have them! Call was written by two women in their twenties, Miller and Katie Ann Naylon. Ari Graynor was also the executive producer.
2. Happy endings come in all shapes and sizes: No, not those kinds of happy endings. Without giving away all the juicy details, let me just say that according to Call, there’s more than one way end up on the winning side of a two-hour movie about women in their twenties. Dudes are well and good and all, but they are not the only ticket to a happy ending. Career success counts. Friendship counts. Emotional wellness counts. Oh haiii, women are complicated and men do not solve all the problems!
3. Sexual reputations = complicated: Avoiding spoilers, one of my favorite elements of Call was its willingness to play with stereotypes of female sexuality. What begins as a straight-up, boring, been-there-seen-that slut/prude dichotomy takes some fun twists and lands in a much more nuanced space. Wait, you mean you can’t tell shit about a person’s sexual history by the way they dress? Mind blown.
4. Female friends are not just sidekicks: More attention lately (thanks to Girls and Sheila Heti’s How Should a Person Be) has been to paid the specific intensity of girl on girl friendships. In my opinion, phone sex is just the backdrop for a pretty excellent exploration of the potent combination of admiration, devotion, jealousy, insecurity, and love that form the bedrock of most uber-tight lady bonds.
5. Jumpsuits:
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