Support the Girls

Feminism flourishes in the most unlikely of places in a genial dramedy from Andrew Bujalski (Computer Chess) that shows the difference one person can make. The setting is sports bar Double Whammies, where the scantily clad team are shielded from the boorish clientele by Regina Hall's maternal manager, who we see being buffeted from one crisis to the next over the course of one day. Her noble efforts cross over from the professional to the personal, as she solves childcare issues and raises money to help with the legal mishaps of her staff. Support the Girls is a deceptively modest effort, concerned as it often is with life's mundane dramas, but Bujalski deals deftly with relationship breakdowns, casual sexism and racism, and the threats these ladies routinely face. Meanwhile, Hall's sensitive, sincere and affecting performance as a woman making a stand for dignity in a deeply disrespectful environment may be her finest work to date, and the strength of the sisterhood is inspiring.