There's often a fine line between quirky and irritating films with many finding the mumblecore genre a particular offender but personally I've never really had a problem with those sort of films until I watched Damsels in Distress which was at times amusing but another times fairly annoying. Whit Stillman's film sees Analeigh Tipton's Lily arrive as a sophomore transfer to a college in which she is soon taken under the win of Greta Gerwig's Violet and her minions Heather and Rose. The trio, who work in the college's suicide help centre, seem to want to cheer up students by having them learn to tap-dance while Violet herself is attempting to star a new dance craze. They also invite Violet into their world in which they often hang around with the fraternity boys as they harmless and dumb so they can be easily moulded into the perfect men however Violet's heart is broken when her intended man goes off with one of the girls they are trying to help. As Violet runs away from the college her friends think she may have done something drastic, with Heather revealing the truth about the real Violet, however she is saved by a bottle of hand-soap. At the same time Lily is going through some personal trauma over her own as she is attracted to the handsome intellectual French student Xavier who unfortunately already has a girlfriend so her eye is drawn instead to Adam Brody's cheerful Charlie. Eventually Xavier and Lily get together but his bedtime games don't sit well with her, and don't make her sit well either, so she turns back to Charlie however it is he and Violet who may have more in common.
Stillman's Ivy League College world is somewhat old-fashioned in its design with our Damsels not paying any attention to what's going on on Facebook but instead marching to their own drum by walking in a dignified manner around the campus trying to help all the people they can. In the first twenty minutes or so of the film I found Violet and company utterly irritating and it is only really when we find out the truth about her that we become more sympathetic towards her while her relationship with Charlie also helps her seem like more of a normal human being. I personally think Stillman wants us to view the film through the eyes of Lily who is bemused by most of the antics of her new found friends but goes along with occasionally challenging Violet who is more than willing to be challenged because she's just that sort of character. Lily's assertion that some people don't want to be quirky but would rather be normal is one that would strike a chord with a lot of viewers of this film and I think in a way the director may be subtly hitting out at some of the same films of the genre. Thankfully his leading actress is Greta Gerwig who has great timing and delivery plus she's someone who is convincing enough as a student who thinks everything she does is for the greater good of the college but sometimes has a sense of self-importance. Adam Brody has some great chemistry with Gerwig and the two bounce off each other perfectly in the second half of the film as Violet gets closer to creating her own dance craze. I also quite enjoyed Analeigh Tipton as the 'normal girl' who suddenly finds her being charmed by a sleazy Frenchmen and taken in by a group of slightly offbeat females though again she more than holds her own. I do feel somewhat sorry for Megalyn Echikunwoke and Carrie MacLemore who have little to do as Rose and Heather respectively however the former does have a knack of repeating the line 'playboy operator' while the latter's romance with the brutish Thor is one of the comic highlights of the film due to the fact that he never learnt the name of any of the colours. Overall there's much to like about Damsels in Distress such as the lead performances, the lighter moments in the script and the way the college is designed but for me there were moments that I found deeply annoying which I think stopped me from enjoying the film as a whole.
Verdict: With lovely performances from Geriwg and Brody as well as some truly funny moments Damsels in Distress is a somewhat likeable film however for me there were too many irritating sections so for that reason I can only give it a 6.5/10
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