20th Century Women

Annette Bening stars as a mum enlisting two friends (Greta Gerwig and Elle Fanning) to help her son navigate adolescence in Mike Mills’s comedy-drama.

Set in 1979 Santa Barbara, California, the film follows Dorothea, a determined single mother in her mid-50s raising her adolescent son, Jamie, at a moment brimming with cultural change and rebellion. Dorothea turns to two younger women – Abbie, a free-spirited punk artist living as a boarder in their home, and Julie, a savvy and provocative teenage neighbour – to help with Jamie’s upbringing.

With an all-star ensemble, this is a wonderfully funny and astute drama from Mike Mills, who earned an Oscar nomination for a screenplay loosely based on his own upbringing. While many of the laughs arise from bohemian eccentricities, the film prioritises richly drawn characters over detached quirk. Mills crafts a genuinely affecting tale, offering offbeat insights into perils of parenthood, while perfectly evoking the cusp of the 1980s, as punk radicalism gives way to a more conventional decade.