Review: "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret." Is A Sorely-Needed Breath of Fresh Air

Kelly Fremon Craig gives Judy Blume's classic novel a touching adaptation.

May 4, 2023

In 1970, Bradbury Press published American author Judy Blume’s novel, Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret., a 149-page assault on conservative American sensibilities. The book’s protagonist, sixth-grader Margaret Simon, grows up in an interfaith household with a Christian mother and Jewish father. Upon moving from New York City to the New Jersey suburbs, Margaret befriends neighborhood girl Nancy Wheeler whose frankness about mature topics inspires Margaret to contemplate her impending puberty.

It was a watershed literary moment: a female author got published speaking openly about the female adolescent experience. Margaret gets empowered to make her own choices. Faith doesn't get forced upon her; her physical transformation gets met with curiosity and anticipation instead of fear, loathing, and the resulting oppression many women experienced.

Blume’s novel received overwhelming critical attention, particularly from those dissatisfied with its honest thematic approach. The country, locked in a patriarchal vice grip, was partially unwilling to embrace the novel's unapologetic perspective on womanhood. Our values were still “old-fashioned;” for many, a young girl having bodily and philosophical autonomy was unconscionable.

Fifty-three years later, Blume’s book has received a cinematic treatment. Although we have much road to travel, we have changed since 1970. Women can have careers and get celebrated for their physical independence. We don’t attach as much shame to the novel's topics (except Florida...).

Yet, that aforementioned untraveled road offers Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. a chance few films receive: to justify itself.

We don’t need it, and no one was publicizing some desperate desire for it, so why is it, and can it make that feel pertinent to our lives over five decades after the novel’s release?

The answer begins with an article published by NPR’s Linda Holmes that contends that Margaret’s story shows her experiencing the travails of impending adolescence in a way specific to her, thus making the story relatable but not universal.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

All stories are universal, and the most nuanced characters possess the necessary subtleties for every viewer to see their journey mirrored by the character's. Faith, geography, home dynamics, era, and culture influence how we experience the world; when imbued with our personalities, no two experiences, while foundationally exact, can genuinely be the same. However, the best stories challenge and inspire us to look inward and seek the commonalities on a deep enough level to feel that symbiosis.

Is Craig’s movie that great story? Yes and no.

Audiences will watch the movie through their fingers, at least when they don’t have their faces in their palms, and therein lies the magic. Topics like menstruation shouldn’t be taboo; we should celebrate the forwardness with which Margaret and Nancy confront the changes that cause self-consciousness. It takes courage to embrace the unfamiliar and anticipate the strange, even if it’s not to the adults who have the wisdom and perspective to offer.

Are You There God? is master of the tightrope; never do we cringe, only relate. Our collective sighs, giggles, and groans are manifestations of getting dragged back into our youth and wishing for Margaret the same clarity and relief we eventually achieved. It’s never a desire to escape the awkwardness or irritation at a heavy-handed approach to the subject matter. Every pubescent meltdown or hormonal hiccup is laced with innocence while being forward enough to feel authentic.

It’s the film’s calling card. We may recall our experiences and draw humorous parallels, but the movie never tries to be funny. It doesn’t reach for a laugh to compensate for lacking depth. It goes with the flow and embraces its natural comedy, whether a mother’s questioning her daughter’s need for a bra or the scandalous goings-on of a childish spin on “7 Minutes in Heaven.”

Of course, the sincerity of these scenarios and on-the-nose nature of their reflection of puberty never feel memorable, but in a strange revelation for a movie, that’s good. Life is full of many memories about many things; sometimes, the feeling recollection gives us matters more than the specific memory.

After all, we age. We grow. We change. As we mature, we prioritize and value different things. We forget that which meant something at 12 but not so much at 24, and continue until we’re so old that our entire life feels like one gigantic memory. It stops being about what made us laugh and becomes simply knowing that we did. Are You There God? won’t leave anyone cackling as they quote Margaret’s agonized monologues verbatim, but they’ll remember feeling warm and amused by her circumstances.

It’s a critical element to master as we transition into an age of representative filmmaking. Marginalized groups have power and purpose because we’ve grown to embrace what spent decades dividing us. Margaret’s story is inherently human, but it’s also innately feminine, and no matter how deeply any gender can relate to puberty, there’s no escaping that fact. Craig never shies away from this, instead challenging herself not to compromise Margaret’s feminine perspective while still being relatable to everyone.

Usually, those who’ve long gotten oppressed imbue their storytelling with that trauma. The writing becomes overblown, the acting melodramatic, and the passion for finally having the freedom to share their stories overshadows the storytelling. Women are getting their moment in the sun, but Craig balances that opportunity with remembering that it's always the story, not the storyteller that comes first.

It’s why it always feels like a human story experienced by females instead of a female story experienced by thinly-imagined people. Much of the film is anxiously awaiting puberty, which is universal, but girls confront gender-specific changes that are unideal.

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Men’s most gender-specific trial is a broken voice until it deepens for good and becomes every teenage girl’s dream come true.

Women bleed (profusely and from a severely undesirable location), cramp, and become moody and irritable, emotions over which they lack control or the autonomy to seize it. Men get erections, which, from the age of 15 on, are the greatest thing ever given to man.

Thus, in a restaurant bathroom, when Nancy, having previously lied about getting her first period, menstruates for the first time and cries, her tears are a gut punch. If ever men lacked the necessary understanding to sympathize with women, this is the moment for that understanding to manifest. Nancy is scared, alone, and confused, confronting a reality she eagerly awaited only to realize she was unprepared to tackle it. The only solace she finds is in begging for her mother, a heartbreaking reminder that simply because your body says you’re becoming an adult doesn’t mean you aren’t lightyears away from truly being one.

Are You There God? has its faults and would be a stronger film had they gotten resolved. Though adorable in her best moments, Abby Ryder Fortson lacks the earnestness to legitimize Margaret’s turmoil. The story often feels disjointed and unsure, constantly starting threads it never explores.

Margaret gets assigned religion as her year-long research project; from a trip to Temple with her Jewish grandmother and confession inside a local church, the movie aims to explore how this impacts her journey. Sadly, for how much fanfare it receives, culminating in Margaret’s defiant declaration of disbelief in the almighty, it never feels like it impacted Margaret as she made her way through her experiences.

Even her relationships with her mother, Barbara, and grandmother, Sylvia, the two women in her life that give both knowledge and trust, feel like figments of Margaret’s life more than legitimate figures of love and understanding. The film establishes how critical these bonds are for Margaret but does little to develop them.

In the abstract, it's a brilliant choice; Margaret is becoming her own person, seeking connections outside the home and learning to navigate her life on her terms, as we all do through every phase of life. We also find that, no matter how independent we want to be, we always return to the familiarity of our loved ones when times get toughest. Unfortunately, Are You There God? never quite strikes this balance, forcing Barbara and Sylvia to be nothing more than well-acted plot devices.

We could’ve done with fewer puberty freakouts and more crushing on the neighborhood lawnmower, Moose, because for as well as the movie balances Margaret’s feminine experience with the universality of her plights, exploration of her first crush would have deepened the pubescent awkwardness more than her 5,000th plea to the heavens for boobs and menstrual cramps.

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Yet, for its faults, it succeeds because it evokes those feelings that define life more than the experiences from which they came. We find peace in knowing that our friendships turned out like Margaret’s; at film’s end, The Pre-Teen Sensations do not splinter.

In youth, incompatibilities and disagreements rarely end relationships; we crave connection, often defining ourselves by the principle of having it, healthy or unhealthy. Still, we mature, even in the short time Margaret lives from beginning to end. As we grow, we realize, one long, slow step at a time, that although we cannot help who we feel drawn to, investment is a choice, and over that, we do have control.

Nancy’s lies and backbiting don’t condemn her; she’s a child navigating a tricky time, and the movie never villainizes her. It also doesn’t chide Margaret for leaving Nancy at the end-of-year festivities to dance with the class laughingstock, premature grower Laura Danker, whose soft-spoken kindness appeals more to Margaret than Nancy’s brashness. One friend, Janie, joins Margaret and Laura, while the other, Gretchen, stays by Nancy, who looks on at her friends in sadness. No one is wrong; no one is right. Everyone is young, just trying to figure it out.

For this reason, Are You There God? needed a movie. We feel puberty long after it's passed. Some menstruate, cramp, bloat, snap at loved ones, and develop an appetite that a Harry Potter feast couldn’t satiate. Others endure the pain of sleeping on an erection, reeking of odors spawned from the deepest circle of hell (that get masked with five coatings of Axe body spray), and wake up with their underwear superglued to their genitals. Regardless, we all make it through because, in the journey of life, that’s what we’re all doing; inhaling, exhaling, taking two steps forward and one step back, trying our best, failing as often as we succeed, and looking around at everything and everyone and realizing that, in the end, when it comes to navigating the difficulties and inevitabilities of life, no one is right and no one is wrong.

We end with a flawed film that perseveres to become something sorely needed: a movie that answers the question it poses. Ultimately, Margaret gets her first period, realizes her true self, becomes confident enough to strike out on her own, and embraces life as it is, warts and all. Even if you believe as Margaret does, that there is no divine being burning bushes and answering prayers, philosophically, Margaret’s resolution says it all:

Is God there? Yes, Margaret. He is.

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