Movie Review: My Old Ass

While the film My Old Ass may present itself as a goofy comedy exploring what it would be like to be a coming-of-age teenager meeting an older version of herself, it is instead a more existential and heartfelt drama that explores the choices that shape our lives and whether those choices should be second-guessed, ignored, or blindly followed.

On her eighteenth birthday, Elliot (Maisy Stella) embarks on a weekend camping trip with two friends – Ruthie (Maddie Ziegler) and Ro (Kerrice Brooks) – wherein they, among other typical girl’s night out fare, partake of some hallucinogenic mushrooms that bring Maisy face-to-face with her 39-year-old self (played by Aubrey Plaza) who blatantly warns her to stay away from a mysterious boy named Chad that she has never met. Then, of course, the next day, she meets Chad and the advice doesn’t seem as unbelievable as it did just one day earlier.

Director Megan Park – whose 2021’s directorial debut The Fallout, gave a glimpse of what was to come – shines in her junior offering. This is a work that also portends greatness. There is a sureness in Park’s writing and directing here that signals an artist far more comfortable in their craft than perhaps they should be at this stage. Her choices feel natural and the course of the story laid out flow in an effortless manner to say the least. There is a singular hand at work here that makes the whole production all the more intoxicating and mesmerizing.

Maisy Stella in “My Old Ass.” Photo by Marni Grossman/Marni Grossman/Prime.

Having cut her teeth during six seasons of the television drama Nashville, Maisy Stella easily establishes a strong screen presence as the film’s main protagonist, especially when paired against a brilliantly cast Aubrey Plaza as her older incarnation. The two actresses do a remarkable job portraying the same character at different stages of life, yet still adhering to core characteristics. As Chad, Percy Hynes White does an admirable job as the possible love of Elliot’s life who might also be responsible for ruining her entire life as well (at least according to older Elliot anyway). He is as charming and affable as the role requires and it is easy to see how Elliot could both fall for and want to run away from him at the same time for fear of being tied down too quickly.

Overall though, it is Park’s crafty storytelling that carries the film from beginning to end. While some outcomes may seem inevitable, the courses they take are not quite so foreseeable and that makes My Old Ass an intriguing and beguiling romantic adventure of sorts.

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Mike Tyrkus

Editor in Chief at CinemaNerdz.com

An independent filmmaker, co-writer and director of over a dozen short films, the Editor in Chief of CinemaNerdz.com has spent much of the last three decades as a writer and editor specializing in biographical and critical reference sources in literature and the cinema, beginning in February 1991 reviewing films for his college newspaper. He was a member of the Detroit Film Critics Society, as well as the group's webmaster and one-time President for over a decade until the group ceased to exist. His contributions to film criticism can be found in Magill's Cinema Annual, VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever (of which he was the editor for nearly a decade until it too ceased to exist), the International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, and the St. James Film Directors Encyclopedia (on which he collaborated with editor Andrew Sarris). He has also appeared on the television program Critic LEE Speaking alongside Lee Thomas of FOX2 and Adam Graham, of The Detroit News. He currently lives in the Detroit area with his wife and their dogs.

@miketyrkus

Mike Tyrkus

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