Crew
Director/Screenplay – Megan Park, Producers – Tom Ackerley, Josey McNamara, Steven Rales & Margot Robbie, Photography – Kristen Correll, Music – Jaco Caraco & Tyler Hilton, Visual Effects – Alpha Channel & Blue Rain VFX (Supervisor – Aaron Wright), Special Effects Supervisor – Melinda Ramsay, Production Design – Zazu Myers. Production Company – LuckyChap Productions.
Cast
Maisy Stella (Elliott), Percy Hynes White (Chad), Aubrey Plaza (Older Elliott), Kerrice Brooks (Ro), Maria Dizzia (Kathy), Seth Isaac Johnson (Max), Maddie Ziegler (Ruthie), Al Goulem (Tom), Alexandra Rivera (Chelsea), Carter Trozzolo (Spencer)
Plot
Elliott lives on her parents’ cranberry farm in Ontario. She turns eighteen and is preparing to leave town and go off to college in a few weeks’ time. She uses the opportunity to connect with Chelsea, the girl she was always attracted to. While out on an island in the lake overnight with her two best friends Ro and Kathy, Elliott takes some shrooms. During her hallucination, she meets another woman who says she is Elliott’s future 39-year-old self. Elliott presses what she calls ‘My Old Ass’ for questions about what will happen to her. All that Old Ass will tell her is to avoid somebody called Chad. Old Ass leaves her number on Elliott’s cell and the two have continuing conversations as Elliott asks for advice. Not long after, Elliott meets a guy named Chad who has been hired as a worker on the farm for the summer season. Despite her reservations and the warnings from Old Ass, Elliott finds herself being attracted to Chad.
A first glance at the synopsis for My Old Ass – where a teenager encounters her thirtysomething self who gives her advice about changing her life – it seemed a Light Fantasy that is too cute for its own good. It gives the impression it is a variant on a film like Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) or Camille Rewinds (2012) where a middle-aged woman travels back to her teenage years (albeit where the story was told from the perspective of the teen as opposed to the grown-up self). Or perhaps even more so The Kid (2000) where Bruce Willis encounters his annoying eight-year-old self, except in reverse where it is the kid (bumped up a few years in age) who encounters the adult self.
The premise didn’t do much for me but then My Old Ass started getting some very good reviews, even appearing on some Top 10 lists for 2024, so I thought it worth checking out. And in no time, I was won over. It is a beautifully made, acted and written film. It is extremely well cast – as Elliott, Maisy Stella has a freshness and natural energy that carries the film with an effortless ease. She also makes a natural sparring companion to play off Aubrey Plaza who is on great form as Old Ass. So too is Percy Hynes White who projects all the sincerity, cocky charm and unassuming likeability that you want the character to have. When he and Maisy Stella start to come together, it feels perfect and natural without a step wrong. And all of them seem to be having an enormous amount of fun with the dialogue.
Everything about My Old Ass has a freshness where you feel like it is making a romance and Coming of Age film as though nobody has done any of this before. About the only off point is a wholly superfluous scene that has Maisy Stella having a drug trip where she hallucinates performing Justin Bieber’s One Less Lonely Girl (2009). The scenes with Aubrey Plaza’s Old Ass turning up are quirky and amusing. But then the connection with Percy Hynes White takes over and we get Maisy Stella anguishing over whether to get involved with him or not, and whether she is gay or bi.
These aspects work well but for a long time Aubrey Plaza drops off screen. At this point, my criticism seemed to be shaping up to wondering whether the film actually needed the fantastic element of the future self in it or not. Just when you think that My Old Ass has dropped the ball of its fantastic premise, Aubrey Plaza reappears again at the end and delivers a twist on proceedings that floors the show and brings the story to an amazing conclusion. (Although [PLOT SPOILERS] the only thing that got me is how Maisy armed with the knowledge that she is given could not possibly try to change things).
My Old Ass was the second feature film directed by the Canadian Megan Park, who has a career as an actress going back to the mid-2000s. As an actress, she can be spotted in Diary of the Dead (2007) and was a regular on The Secret Life of an American Teenager (2008-13). She had previously directed/written The Fallout (2021) set in the aftermath of a school shooting.
(Winner in this site’s Top 10 Films of 2024 list. Nominee for Best Original Screenplay, Best Actress (Maisy Stella) and Best Supporting Actress (Aubrey Plaza) at this site’s Best of 2024 Awards).
Trailer here