Paul Thomas Anderson’s new movie One Battle After Another has an eclectic cast, with leading man Leonardo DiCaprio supported by Sean Penn, Benicio del Toro, newcomer Chase Infiniti, musician Alana Haim, Regina Hall, and rapper Shayna McHayle (also known as Junglepussy). Penn and Haim have previously shared the screen in Anderson’s Licorice Pizza, but Hall and McHayle go further back: They’re both cast members from the 2018 dramedy Support the Girls, one of the least-seen among the best American films of the 2010s. Both performers are good in One Battle, but they’re not the focus of the movie. Support the Girls gives them more to do.

At the time, Support the Girls was the latest pivot from indie filmmaker Andrew Bujalski, who started in the ultra-low-budget “mumblecore” movement of 2000s before moving into more experimental territory with the period curio Computer Chess and attempting something like a normal rom-com with the sweetly odd Results. In some ways, Support the Girls swings back to Bujalski’s original mission of introducing some naturalism back into cinema, favoring character and behavior over plot. But it’s also more polished and accessible than anything he made leading up to it.  

Why Watch Support the Girls Tonight?

There aren’t a lot of mainstream movies that capture the day-to-day experience of normal, non-glamorous work, maybe because of the understandable perception that audiences wouldn’t be all that jazzed to see a movie replicate the tedium, frustrations, and complications of everyday life on their downtime. What this line of thinking doesn’t consider is how cathartic it can be to see a movie acknowledge these challenges without amping them up into melodrama. Support the Girls is heightened enough to work as entertainment – it takes place over a particularly eventful day at a restaurant, with plenty of funny moments – while pausing for enough small moments to stay grounded. It’s like a less broadly comic version of a 12-hours-of-complications work-shift farce like Clerks.

The movie is set somewhere at once friendlier and more fraught than a convenience store: Double Whammies, a sports bar/restaurant in the Dallas area that’s basically like a slightly homier version of Hooters, with the tiniest smidge of local charm. Much of that charm comes from the dedication of Lisa (Regina Hall), the manager who treats her younger employees (played by a terrific ensemble that includes McHayle, Haley Lu Richardson, and Dylan Gelula) with respect while managing a daily spate of crises. The cable’s not working (a major drawback at a sports-themed restaurant), the owner (James Le Gros) has gripes with every other decision Lisa makes, new employees need training, a longtime employee has hospital bills (and maybe needs a lawyer), and, on a more personal level, Lisa’s marriage seems to be falling apart.

Accordingly, the movie is anchored by Hall, whose performance was nominated by a bunch of critics’ groups during the year-end 2018 awards derby but didn’t make it all the way to a much-deserved Oscar nomination. Anyone who knows Hall primarily from the super-broad comedy of the Scary Movie pictures might be blown away by her work here. Even those more familiar with her greater range might be taken aback by the tour-de-force of micro-reactions that flit across her face as she toggles between her unflappable, people-pleasing work self and her more vulnerable side. Sometimes, in her perfectly modulated tone, she offers a glimpse of both at once.

Support the Girls tells you what it’s up to from its first scene, when it juxtaposes the kind of colorful opening credits and upbeat pop song that often serve as a warm comedy’s tone-setting with shots of suburban-sprawl highways, while the pop song has the tinny remove of being played diegetically, as if from a car stereo, rather than blasting in hi-fi on the soundtrack. Any funny, upbeat, or affirming moments it offers (and there are plenty!) will be accompanied by the endless white noise of capitalism. Admittedly, that sounds even bleaker than just recreating the tiring events of a single workday. But it’s also cathartic to hear someone say it, or scream it, so clearly.

Jesse Hassenger (@rockmarooned) is a writer living in Brooklyn. He’s a regular contributor to The A.V. Club, Polygon, and The Week, among others. He podcasts at www.sportsalcohol.com, too.

Stream Support the Girls on Tubi