"Wildflower" stays true, if not always focused, with nice performances and deft tonal shifts

Wildflower (2023)

Any film “inspired by true events” is bound with the responsibility of telling the story as honestly as possible. Take “Wildflower,” a story involving a teenage girl growing up with intellectually disabled parents, and there’s the worry that the film will come off as mawkish or misguided. This material is clearly so personal for director Matt Smukler (having made a 2020 documentary with the same title and story) that he makes sure his narrative feature debut doesn’t hit a false note. A coming-of-age film that straddles drama and comedy deftly (for the most part), “Wildflower” handles its tough subject matter in a sensitive way without getting too melodramatic or offending anyone.

The film is primarily told from the perspective of ambitious Nevada teen Bea Johnson, played with equal parts self-possession, vulnerability, and edgy independence by Kiernan Shipka (2017’s “The Blackcoat’s Daughter”). Short for Bambi (her mother’s favorite cartoon character), Bea is the child of two neurodivergent parents, Derek (Dash Mihok) and Sharon (autistic actress Samantha Hyde), who got hitched and pregnant against the wishes of both of their parents. Since she was 10, Bea remembers helping them both get ready for work, clean the house, and be on time with the mortgage. When we meet Bea, she is in a coma, telling her story in a sardonic voice-over and going back to the beginning. As Bea is lying in her hospital bed, she’s surrounded by her big extended family of different personalities, including two wildly opposite grandmothers, Peg (Jean Smart) and Loretta (Jacki Weaver). A social worker named Mary (Erika Alexander) comes in to find out what caused the coma; Mary was the one there for Bea as a child after a minor car accident when she drove Derek’s truck. How Bea fell into the coma becomes less relevant than how Bea has managed to try being a normal teenager and keep trucking through life's challenges. 

Kiernan Shipka has always been an engaging and poised talent, and she remains likable and accessible as Bea throughout. In short, Shipka is the glue (and Ryan Kiera Armstrong, from the “Firestarter” remake, is very good as 10-year-old Bea in flashbacks). The rest of the cast as the extended family is terrific, even if not everyone is able to get their due, like Alexandra Daddario and Reid Scott as Bea’s comparably proper aunt and uncle. Jean Smart is moving in just a handful of scenes as Sharon’s warm, now-divorced mother Peg, who took care of Bea as a newborn. The tension between Peg and her husband (Brad Garrett), who had different opinions about Sharon raising a child, is so raw and authentic that it leaves one as rattled as Peg. Charlie Plummer brings extra shadings to the part of Bea’s love interest Ethan, the new boy in school and a cancer survivor. In the case of Jacki Weaver set in wacky mode as Derek’s gaudily dressed, unfiltered alcoholic mother who never abides by the rules of non-smoking areas, some get too much to do. Most importantly, Dash Mihok and Samantha Hyde make Derek and Sharon feel like real people; the story may be more directly about their daughter, but they never feel like saintly mascots or gawked-at sideshows.

Sure, “Wildflower” tells a familiar story where the child must be the parent and, hence, follows a lot of the same beats as many misfit coming-of-agers. Bea stands up perfectly to an ignorant mean girl with a great one-liner at the ready. Bea has a temporary falling-out with her best friend Nia (played by natural newcomer Kannon Omachi). She even has the most supportive high school guidance counselor (Victor Rasuk) who hopes she’ll get a head start on her college applications and live for herself. It can be a little unfocused at times, but Jana Savage’s screenplay does, however, find enough specificity and relatable avenues into this universal (or clichéd) formula. A lot of this comes from a place of truth. 

Grade: B -

Momentum Pictures released “Wildflower” (105 min.) in theaters on March 17, 2023.