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Jul 24, 2014 By Kyle Turner Web Exclusive

It’s funny seeing Elizabeth Olsen and Dakota Fanning side by side in a film, as the former grew up with two child stars as siblings and the latter grew up on the screen. Yet, watching them together as they go through formative experiences the summer before college, it’s like watching both, nonetheless, enter a new stage of their career. It’s a shame, though, that Very Good Girls, the directorial debut of Naomi Foner (screenwriter of Losing Isaiah) is in fact not very good (sorry).

What’s curious about the film is that, while it focuses its drama primarily on the relationship dynamic between best friends and frustrated virgins Lily (Fanning) and Gerry (Olsen), it does little to honestly explore the stigma of virginity and why it matters to people, regardless of gender. It addresses it in a oft visited fashion, the “I don’t want to be a virgin before college” trope, but while its dramatic slant is perhaps more unorthodox than it is normally handled (usually in sex comedy form), it seems rather distanced from its own material. A sense of perspective seems almost like it was supposed to be there but was somehow lost in the mix.

While Olsen and Fanning are surely talented, such a cold screenplay – one that feels hard to engage with – ends up leaving the actresses little to work with, so they give the impression that they’re struggling to bring their best to the material at hand. While Foner’s direction is fine, it’s not very worthy of note.

Adolescent female desire is surprisingly muted, and the chemistry between Olsen and Fanning is imperfect. But Olsen gives a performance on her own that’s compelling enough to keep watching, making this average film worth sitting through.

tribecafilm.com/tribecafilm/filmguide/very-good-girls

Author rating: 5.5/10