Plan B
In 108 minutes, Plan B, directed by Natalie Morales, perfectly sums up the utter panic and chaos that is teenagerhood. The film follows two girls on an epically hyperventilating and winding road-trip to find the Plan B pill within their 24-hour window. There is not a ticking clock on the screen, but through the hyperactive dialogue and split-second decisions gone wrong, viewers can feel the powders of the Plan B pill disintegrating grain by grain.
Sunny (Kuhoo Verma) and Lupe (Victoria Morales) are two best friends who are comically polar opposites. Sunny is the perfect Indian daughter with a pink-painted room and a variety of stuffed animals at her disposal, while Lupe is the rebellious child in a strict Catholic household. The first scene shows her father demanding the removal of her black lipstick, which she re-applies quickly after. However different, they both struggle to fit in with the ‘popular’ crowd and approach their fantasy partners. The movie takes on a bit of a Booksmart vibe, as they decide to throw a party to advance their sexual experiences. This party ultimately leads to Sunny losing her virginity to the wrong guy and later discovering the remnants of a wrongly used condom. Their first decision is one of merit: go to the pharmacy. After being denied at their local pharmacy due to the pharmacist’s personal beliefs, they decide to take a road trip to the closest Planned Parenthood three hours away. Thus begins their legendary journey!
As it would, this three-hour journey quickly devolves into a two-day trip, due to several bad decisions and a general lack of awareness. Their first mistake involves the assumption that all highway exits lead to the same place. After getting lost in the middle of nowhere, they stop at a gas station where they are confronted by two predatorial young men, only to be rescued by the eccentric bat-wielding owner who trades a hit of a weed vape for two free necklaces. After telling the owner about the dire need for the Plan B pill, she points them in the direction of her nephew, who ends up being a sketchy high-school dropout type selling drugs out of a playground. Sunny and Lupe manage to wade (i.e., escape) their way out of yet another dangerous situation and finally reach the highway again, only for Lupe to secretly take a pit stop to see her online girlfriend play in a bowling alley without Sunny’s permission.
Though the girls tend to forget it at moments in the film, you’ll remember that they’re on a timeline. Sunny’s anger at the bowling alley excursion is thus understandable. Throughout the film there are hilarious references to the “Indian mafia”, or Indian people who Sunny is convinced follow her and report back to her mother. At the bowling alley Sunny randomly bumps into her crush. For a moment, the panic of the situation is lost, and Sunny and Lupe each have an individual heart-warming moment where they become closer to gaining their first S.O. Not a moment too soon, they land in trouble again, as Lupe’s new girlfriend seems to have stolen their car. After finding the car at a wild party only to accidentally hit someone with it, the girls finally wind up at the Planned Parenthood, only to discover that the location has closed permanently. Though you want Sunny to get her pill, you can’t help but feel that this was inevitable, due to the ongoing debate about abortion in today’s media and politics.
The drive back home carries a heavy silence that abruptly ends with Sunny’s mother’s anger. Sunny reveals the purpose behind stealing her car, but smartly withholds the details of the journey. The movie comes full circle back at the hometown pharmacy, where Sunny’s mother demands the pill from the pharmacist whose pleasant smile made my blood boil. The final shot is what everyone’s been waiting for: a bottle of water and a pill.
Someone may want to see Plan B because they want to relive the experience of being a teenager and not being able to make comprehensive decisions. This film provides that, but fails to incorporate originality. It seems like a classic tale of a the straightlaced girl getting pregnant her first time having sex, and ultimately having to go on a lengthy road trip to solve her problem. Somehow, a road trip always manages to sneak its way into every teen movie. Fortunately, there isn’t a cringey montage to suffer through. Considering the small, independent film sentiment I gathered from this movie, I had hoped that the director would have cast actual teenagers, but that was another teen movie trap into which the film fell. However, the excellent comedic acting of Victoria Morales and Kuhoo Verma manages to make you forget that they’re actually old enough to rent a car and have their own insurance. There are several supporting characters sprinkled in throughout the film, so they did a great job in keeping the audience engaged. The few supporting characters that leave a lasting impression are the druggie selling pills out of a playground, who proves to be an excellent character during the climax of the film with perfect comedic timing; the pharmacist, who only appears for less than two minutes, but manages to enrage you with the tipping point being his toothy smile, suggesting he is anything but sexist and corrupt; the gas station owner, who proves to be the wacky confidant we never knew we needed; and finally, the sexual education teacher, played by none other than SNL legend Rachel Dratch. In only five minutes, she reminds you of high school and that one awkward teacher who received the worst assignment of teaching sex-ed to horny teenagers. The structure of the film would have benefitted from more attention, as the ending is too abrupt, but overall, you leave the film wanting to join Sunny and Lupe in their next adventure, suggesting that Natalie Morales completed her job as director.
Every teenager needs to see this movie. Though not a blockbuster coming-of-age film like Superbad or Booksmart, this film takes on the tone of Ladybird: a quiet, comedy-focused movie with bursts of life lessons to educate the audience about the relatable pain of being a teenager. And this film covers all of it. Lupe struggles to come out to her Catholic father and her best friend, despite knowing that she will have support. This narrative is not addressed quite as frequently but is important for people to understand that the institutionalized fear is normal. Until the end of the film, Sunny makes failed attempts to stand up to herself and reveal her true personality to her mother. The film also deals with the pressure put on teenagers to become adults faster than they would like, and most importantly, the pure fear that comes with the possibility of pregnancy. Finally, it addresses the rapidly changing tides of friendship that rise and fall with the teenage brain. With a five-minute guest appearance of Rachel Dratch as the awkward sex education teacher—comedy at its finest—this film perfectly captures the worries of teenagers while still maintaining its role as a lighthearted comedy.
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