Am I OK? (2022)

Dakota is the warmest color

Dakota Johnson has got something. I don’t know what you call it. It’s reverse-double-whammy resting bitch face, or something like that. She always gives off the air that she’s above the material she’s in, like she actively disdains it, and yet she’s also making that material significantly better. It’s undercut with some self-deprecation, somehow, so the audience still likes her in spite of it. This was weaponized unintentionally (at least I think unintentionally) in the stinker Madame Web. And now it’s used very intentionally in Am I OK?, a grown-up coming-out dramedy.

The film is the directorial debut of comedian Tig Notaro and her wife Stephanie Allynne, and the writing debut for Lauren Pomerantz, who previously worked on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. (All lesbians, in case that wasn’t abundantly clear.) The film has been in distribution hell for two years following a strong word of mouth premiere at Sundance in 2022, but is finally out on Max. Thus, from a production timeline perspective, the film is really closer to Cha Cha Real Smooth for Johnson, and both are examples of the kinds of movies that I wish Johnson would make approximately one hundred of.

Lucy (Johnson) and Jane (Sonoya Mizuno) are longtime best friends living in Los Angeles in the comfortable stasis of freewheeling twenties that dragged into early thirties when such aimlessness starts to become culturally frowned upon. The pair complement each other perfectly: Lucy is indecisive, reserved, and absent-minded, Jane is high-energy, unfiltered, and a little bit bossy. Johnson and Mizuno convey an easy chemistry that makes this lifelong friendship seem real. Jane is in a steady relationship with Danny (Jermaine Fowler), while Lucy is forever boyfriend-free for reasons she’s skittish about — no one is quite right for her, she claims, even longtime bud and super nice guy Ben (Whitmer Thomas).

Everything is turned upside down when Jane accepts a promotion offer that will send her to London (where she grew up, and the source of her faint accent). Lucy is devastated. She gets drunk on tequila crying about how much she’ll miss her best friend. She gives about 1% effort to put on a straight, happy face for Jane’s promotion and upward social trajectory.

That night, in a drunken haze, Lucy admits to Jane that she might be attracted to women. It’s framed in such a way that it’s pretty clear Lucy has some lingering feelings for Jane that she knows the straight Jane would never reciprocate, reluctantly blurted like it’s a last chance to confess you’re in love with someone before you never see then again. All of the sudden the intimacy in their friendship has a strange air, a pathetic self-delusion for Lucy and a patronizing patience by Jane.

The weeks leading up to Jane’s departure see a rising friction between the pair. Jane starts spending more time with the coworker who is moving with her, the self-absorbed Kat (Molly Gordon). Lucy tries to navigate a flirtation with her own co-worker Brittany (Kiersey Clemons). Each is a little bit too wrapped up in their own drama to pay attention to the other’s large emotional burden. They have a blow-up, and it’s a doozy.

Am I OK? has the pitch and content typical of a straight-to-streaming film in the 2024 movie landscape, but its execution is sharper and more ambitious than most streamer fare. What it really made me think of was Walking and Talking, Nicole Holofcener’s debut, but with a coming-out twist. Both films are about city-dwelling best friends having trouble transitionining out of young adulthood and risking their connection in the process. Both feel lived in and genuine. Notaro and Allynne are clearly inspired by the golden ‘90s dramedies; Am I OK? uses a slightly grainy, vintage look. (A cinematographer I follow speculated the crew used throwback lenses to evoke that look.) Some of the production is great, too — Johnson wears a couple of hats you’ll have to see to believe.

And yet Notaro and Allynne do let their rookie status show: Their compositions are soundstagey and flat, and the establishing shots are either stock footage or just outright bad. This kind of stuff doesn’t matter too much for a film like this, which is much more about cast chemistry and strong writing, but it’s also the kind of stuff that elevates a film of this caliber from solidly good to actually great (see, again, Walking and Talking).

I’ve focused on the characters and vibes, but it’s also worth noting that this is a funny film. It’s not a laughing-so-hard-you-can’t-breathe type joyride, although there is a scene near the end of the film that almost gets that far. It’s just a solid cadence of well-delivered jokes, and, better yet, the jokes actually sound like a real human would make them. The aforementioned single great scene, by the way, is a retreat that plays out like a cross between “hammock district” Hank Scorpio gag and the yoga scene in the extended cut of Forgetting Sarah Marshall, with a hysterical cameo appearance from Notaro.

In all, Am I OK? (much better than Not Okay, for the record) is a charming little trifle and another reminder that I should check out anything that Dakota Johnson is cast in, bringing whatever weird energy she has to every project.

Is It Good?

Good (5/8)

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