Perhaps one day Hollywood will lose interest in people losing their virginity. But until then, it will continue to produce formulaic peons to the only aspect of adulthood Tinsel Town ever gets enthusiastic about.
Actresses Dakota Fanning and Elizabeth Olsen star in the upcoming movie “Very Good Girls” as best friends who make a pact to lose their virginity before heading off to college. Directed by Naomi Foner, the film boasts a cast including Demi Moore, Richard Dreyfuss, Ellen Barkin, Peter Sarsgaard and Clark Gregg. The film premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival and hits theaters July 25. Continued after the video.
Billed as a “coming-of age-story” in media outlets such as The Huffington Post and Us Magazine, the movie associates losing virginity with reaching adulthood. As the trailer revealed: “When we lose our innocence, we have to find ourselves.”
Twenty-year-old actress Dakota Fanning plays Lilly, who complains to Gerry (25-year-old Elizabeth Olsen) that, “We’re going to college, and we’re still virgins.” Gerry responds, “We’ve got to get over this hump.” Their friendship becomes threatened when they both fall for “the ice cream guy from the beach” (Boyd Holbrook).
The film fits into the same agenda as last summer’s “The To Do List,” when Brandy Klark (Aubrey Plaza) sets out to lose her virginity and learn “Sometimes sex is just sex.” It’s a lesson plenty of people learn as they grow up. Just not Hollywood.
— Katie Yoder is Staff Writer, Joe and Betty Anderlik Fellow in Culture and Media at the Media Research Center. Follow Katie Yoder on Twitter.
