Miller's Girl | Film Review

A creative writing assignment complicates the relationship between a teacher (Martin Freeman) and his student (Jenna Ortega).

I heard about this film maybe once and remember being interested in it, but then I never heard anything about it again. So when I saw it was available to rent/buy on Prime Video, I decided to give it a shot. 

I don't know what to make of this one. I didn't hate it, but there wasn't a lot to like.

The only thing I did like was that Martin Freeman and Jenna Ortega worked really well together and had good chemistry. I'd love to see them work together again, in a film with a better plot and a less weird (platonic) relationship.

The characters are written really weirdly. There were many moments when they said things that were just so unbelievable, especially Jenna Ortega's character, Cairo.

Another odd aspect of the film was the tone - I could never tell if things were supposed to feel sinister or not because the film couldn't decide how it wanted the audience to feel or react.

It also felt like the filmmakers didn't really know what they wanted the plot to be, because after a certain point, everything that made sense just kind of stopped working.

It was interesting that the film had the backdrop of academia and literature, but in a film about a potentially forbidden relationship, the relationship should be at the forefront. When the writing project became more important than the relationship, I got a bit bored with it.

Speaking about the writing in general, sometimes it's great (there are some really beautiful spoken word pieces), but sometimes it's way too pretentious and weird.

Overall, there were moments of this film I enjoyed, and I didn't hate the overall product, but it's an odd watch and would have benefitted from a more coherent story.

4.5/10