Yes, God, Yes Review

Certificate: 15

Running time: 78 minutes

Starring: Natalia Dyer, Alisha Boe, Wolfgang Novogratz, Francesca Reale

Directed by: Karen Maine

The story: Catholic schoolgirl Alice finds herself having tempting thoughts after an online chat turns sexual, so she decides to enrol in a programme in hopes of curbing her burgeoning sexual awakening.

The verdict: As a massive Stranger Things fan, I must admit that I was primarily drawn to this film because it stars Natalia Dyer, also known as Nancy Wheeler in the popular Netflix series. However, that is obviously not a prerequisite for watching this film, so don't let that influence you.

Dyer stars as Alice, and Alice is a character that I think will resonate with a lot of people. Alice is a dutiful daughter, a good student and always tries her best to be true to her faith. Alice also eats the junk food that has been hidden at the top of the cupboard, daydreams about her crush whilst in class, and rewinds Titanic multiple times to rewatch the sex scene. Although, she tells her friend that she only rewinds it because she always mishears the dialogue. Overall, she is a pretty typical teenager just trying to find her place in the world.

Alice begins to become more and more curious about sex, a curiosity that is not helped by the information given in morality class at school. All Alice knows is that she is heading down a road which she has been told is sinful. When Alice finally gives in to her feelings during an online chat, she worries that she is now going to go to hell.

Yes, God, Yes addresses so many pertinent issues. It looks at growing up, being a teenager and experiencing sexual awakening. It also looks at what it means to be a teenager brought up with religion and what is like to attend a religious school. But perhaps most interestingly the film explores subjects such as the shame surrounding female masturbation, the difference between how girls are treated compared to boys and how there is a certain hypocrisy in what we are told is wrong by people in authority, who are most likely not as saintly as they seem.

Yes, God, Yes is set in the early noughties and if like me that was a time in which you were also growing up, then there is definitely a nostalgia to this film. From booting up the computer to log into a chatroom to playing snake on your Nokia - I was immediately transported back to my teenage years.

In a lot of ways, Yes, God, Yes is a very simplistic film. It is very linear and does not go off on any tangents or subplots. For some this may watch as slightly boring but with such a slim running time, I found that this did not bother me and I was engaged throughout. There is a mix of comedic elements with more serious elements and I felt that they worked well together.

The young cast is good  and I particularly liked Dyer's performance. Often Alice doesn't speak, yet her face is always expressive and her emotions are always clear - Dyer is well directed in this.

Overall, I really enjoyed this film. Yes, God, Yes captures adolescent female desire in a way rarely shown in film whilst simultaneously managing to expose the hypocrisy of Catholicism in a non confrontational way.

The rating: ✭✭✭✭