A striking moment of pure and bitter realization can happen at any time or in any place. 

For Los Angeles teenager Molly, the high school bathroom is the precise location in which a crushing wave of reality will flow into her life that causes her to rethink how she has spent every day of the past four years of school.

Directed by Olivia Wilde, the whimsical, coming-of-age film Booksmart is the hilarious comedy that all teenagers need to indulge in before walking across the graduation floor. While the uproarious movie is full of classic teenage rebellion, love, and stupidity, it is all able to come together into a movie holding many lessons about youth and friendship beneath its comical cover. 

Valedictorian Molly (Beanie Feldstein) and her best friend Amy (Kaitlyn Dever) head to their last day of senior year knowing their futures are bright and their priorities are perfectly aligned. Much to the dismay of these overachieving girls, their peers have spent the past four years goofing off and throwing outrageous parties rather than spending their nights burying their eyes in the pages of textbooks. After catching wind of news that Molly is not the only student from the school heading to Yale in the fall, the only world she has ever known seems to crumble down in pieces around her. How could the popular, party-oriented students who spent their time doing all of the wrong things be headed to some of the nation’s top schools? 

Such shocking news launches Molly into a state of pure shame. She never thought it was possible to live in both worlds, but her time to experience high school like her other peers isn’t over yet; she and Amy still have one, mere night left. In the time of just one night, Molly and Amy embark on a nasty-but-nice journey to find the perfect party to cram the past four years of fun into the fleeting hours of the night. 

The perfectly chosen cast for the leading roles made the different elements of the film fall together into perfect harmony. The classic high school stereotypes including theater nerds, skaters, and popular kids remained intact throughout the film, and with each scene, the characters each developed their own deep connection to the overarching theme of the life of youth. 

While Booksmart certainly moves fast and provides a stream of consistent comedy to the audience, its plot does not lack valuable lessons and a deeper purpose. As the hours of Molly and Amy’s night pass by, the audience is able to learn much about friendship and the importance it has in their lives. Just like almost every high schooler will experience, Molly and Amy are forced to push their relationship to the edge in order to learn how much they truly need each other. 

Although the film does hold an important message within its storyline, in no way is it ever one to be a bore. As the movie includes many romantic and comedic subplots, different styles of scenes including underwater, horror, and animation all emerge within the runtime of the drama. 

When the film came to a close, the nearly two hours I had spent laughing left me on a high. Rarely are movies produced in which the director is able to portray such real and relatable moments with a large audience, but almost anyone watching Booksmart will be able to understand the confusing and unpredictable nature of high school and all that comes along with it. Whether it be erratic friendship or raging parties, high school surely should create a scrapbook of memories to last forever, and the cast of Booksmart is effortlessly able to remind us all of this in the most entertaining way possible.