Cather­ine, Called Birdy

Being a teenage girl is nev­er easy, and while the cur­rent crop of 14-year-olds might have to con­tend with Tik­Tok and home­work, spare a thought for the young women of Medieval Eng­land – in par­tic­u­lar young Lady Cather­ine (Bel­la Ram­sey), bet­ter know as ​“Birdy”. As the daugh­ter of a Lin­colnshire Lord (Andrew Scott) and his wife (Bil­lie Piper) Birdy has led a fair­ly charmed life thus far, rolling in the mud with her friends and gen­er­al­ly eschew­ing any sort of ​‘lady-like’ behav­iour, but Daddy’s strapped for cash and as Birdy comes of age, she presents a lucra­tive oppor­tu­ni­ty to secure a hefty dowry. Birdy, appalled at the idea of being mar­ried off to any man – much less the boor­ish men her father keeps pick­ing out – begins to rebel, attempt­ing to dis­suade her suit­ors in imag­i­na­tive fashion.

Lena Dun­ham serves as both direc­tor and screen­writer, adapt­ing Karen Cushman’s 1994 young adult nov­el of the same name, which doc­u­ments a year in Birdy’s life through diary entries. Dun­ham retains the diary mechan­ic, with Birdy’s voice-over offer­ing wit­ty asides about the on-screen events and her teenage angst regard­ing her vex­ing sit­u­a­tion. Dun­ham, who has always excelled at cap­tur­ing the capri­cious, some­times self-involved nature of girl­hood, retains Birdy’s intel­li­gence and good humour in her script, which incor­po­rates old-fash­ioned dialect while resist­ing the temp­ta­tion to go all-in on the anachro­nisms, as seems to be the cur­rent fash­ion with peri­od dra­mas (thanks a lot, Yor­gos Lanthimos).

There is one major mod­ern touch – a sound­track com­prised of reworked cov­ers of 90s bangers includ­ing Super­grass’ Alright and Mazzy Star’s Fade Into You. This com­pli­ments Birdy’s youth­ful exu­ber­ance, and feels like a fit­ting way to pay trib­ute to the book’s 90s ori­gins, as well as evok­ing Bri­an Helgeland’s excel­lent 2001 medi­val romp, A Knight’s Tale (the films also share a com­pos­er in Carter Burwell).

A strong ensem­ble com­pli­ment Dunham’s bois­ter­ous script. Ram­sey makes for an imp­ish, sym­pa­thet­ic hero­ine, and there’s even a win­ning turn from Joe Alwyn as Catherine’s beloved Uncle George, who returns from the Cru­sades bat­tle-weary and morose. But it’s Andrew Scott and Bil­lie Piper who steal the show as Birdy’s par­ents, espe­cial­ly in a mov­ing labour scene, and there’s a par­tic­u­lar sense of char­ac­ter growth for Lord Rol­lo, who slow­ly comes to under­stand his head­strong daugh­ter and starts to change his self­ish ways. Dun­ham han­dles heavy sub­jects – includ­ing infant mor­tal­i­ty and mater­nal death – with sen­si­tiv­i­ty and care, and the film deliv­ers moments of emo­tion­al poignan­cy as grace­ful­ly as it does slapstick.

Warmth radi­ates from every detail, from the thought­ful cos­tume design (Lord Rollo’s tiger-print teal robe is a high­light) to the chem­istry between Ram­sey and her on-screen fam­i­ly. It’s a sweet, remark­ably fresh com­ing-of-age film, and while Cather­ine, Called Birdy’s over­ar­ch­ing mes­sages about the impor­tance of fam­i­ly and friends over boys might be famil­iar to the teen movie canon, Dun­ham finds enough fer­tile ground in deliv­ery that her medieval dram­e­dy nev­er out­stays its welcome.