Say When

When rudderless twenty-something Megan (Keira Knightley) attends a high-school reunion, she decides that her relative immaturity is something to celebrate. 
After her childhood sweetheart proposes soon after, she decides to prolong her adolescence, escaping from her tight-knit circle into the company of new teenage friends. "You can’t keep putting aside what you want for some imaginary future. You just have to…go with your gut", she muses.
Well received at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, Say Whe is a coming of age story where the ingénue is nearly thirty years old.  
This is an unusual project for director Lynn Shelton: firstly, she had a multimillion dollar budget but also, this is the first film that she has directed but not written. As a result, Laggies is stylistically different from her previous works. Films such as 2009’s Humpday and 2013's Touchy Feely were impressionistic products of half-penned, half-improvised approach to scripting. Some critics have responded favourably to this change, suggesting that Shelton’s work benefits from the greater structure of novelist Andrea Seigel’s text.
Keira Knightley (Pride and Prejudice, Pirates of the Caribbean) casts off her corset and dons an American accent for this modern role. She joins Hollywood cool-kid Chloë Grace Moretz (Kick Ass, Clouds of Sils Maria), cozying up to the teenage character’s wacky single dad, played by oddly sexy indie favourite Sam Rockwell (The Way Way Back, Moon, Green Mile). 
The ‘female protagonist in quarter-life-crisis’ is nothing new (Girls, Bridesmaids, Sunshine Cleaning, Tiny Furniture, Frances Ha). But what the film lacks in originality, it makes up for in fine performances, good humour and prettiness: HD camerawork and sweetly-hued costumes are a visual delight.