A totally likable if not exactly groundbreaking film: Lady Bird

Greta Gerwig's 2017 film Lady Bird, the directorial debut of this excellent actress, breaks not much new ground but still it's completely watchable, enjoyable, witty, and strangely moving at the end, graced by a terrific performance in the title foel by Saorise Ronan with backup from a strong ensemble cast. OK, so this is one of about a thousand movies about the agony and ecstasy of the last year of h.s., in this case the self-dubbed Lady Bird (birth name Christine) yearns to get out of her home city, Sacramento (also GG's home city, as seen in several of her comedies), and go to an East Coast college, which her parents, specifically her mother - played well by Laurie Metcalf, in fact she could have done a trading spaces w/ I, Tonya's Allison Janney and maybe taken that Oscar - insist they cannot afford (affable but feckless father has been laid off from his job as a programmer). So she proceeds to apply surreptitiously, w/ a little help from Dad - haven't we seen that before (was it Real Women Have Curves?)? Much of the film is about LB's life in high school, through which she follow the familiar path of moving away from her rather plain but sweet bestie and hanging w/ a new set of friends, more hip, aware, good-looking, and wealthy. Again, you can see the antecedents and the likely outcome of this narrative strand (Clueless, et al). Where they movie does break some new ground, however, is its altogether sweet and understanding portrayal of a Catholic girls' high school, in which for once the teachers and school leaders are not all monsters and fanatics: the principal is kind and helpful, the drama coach is sympathetic and engaged w/ the kids, even the woman called upon to lecture the students about the evils of abortion is at least not made out to be a fool. GG has a great sense of comic timing, and gets a lot of laughs out of a scene in which the JV football coach subs for the drama teacher - as well as from some one-liners: Dad knocks on door. LB: Dad? Come in. Dad: How did you know it was me. LB: Mom doesn't knock. She also handles some highly emotional scenes w/ great aplomb, notably a beautiful scene of mother-daughter talking about sex, filmed in reflection from the bathroom mirror, and a terrific scene of LB consoling her ex-boyfriend. Altogether, a likable if not monumental film and suggests good things about Gerwig's potential directing career, which perhaps may follow the acting-to-directing course of Sarah Polley.