Girls Will Be Girls

Sixteen-year-old Mira is the first girl to be elected class president at her elite high school in the Himalayas — just rewards for her application, seriousness, and intelligence. But all this hard work is threatened by the arrival of a handsome new boy in her class. Her mother is concerned enough that she insists on playing chaperone for their homework sessions — but the young man soon has her charmed too, which only stokes Mira’s jealousy.

An Audience and Special Jury prize-winner at Sundance, Shuchi Talati’s sensitive debut feature is an unusual coming-of-age drama for its nuanced and sympathetic portrait of mother-daughter dynamics in a sexually repressive culture; it doesn’t go where you expect.

A resonant and impeccably written film on generational female awakening, mother-daughter affection and rivalry, and bodily autonomy, Girls Will Be Girls is exactly the kind of feminine coming-of-age film (for any age) that we need more of.

Tomris Laffly, Harper’s Bazaar

Sexual coming-of-age […] rooted in the kind of cultural and character specificity that elevates a film past mere premise into something more complex and moving.

Marya E Gates, rogerebert.com

Talati expertly captures the quiet wonder and aching intensity of adolescence, first love, and caring about someone whose dueling duties and desires sometimes stop them from behaving as they know they should.

Proma Khosla, Indiewire