Girls Like Magic

I didn’t realize how little representation there is for messy, mean sapphic women until I watched Girls Like Magic. Mean queers to the front, this movie is for you.

Because it’s a movie about mean queers, Girls Like Magic takes place in Los Angeles. It focuses on two neighbours who become friends. Jamie is an out lesbian with a toxic on-again, off-again relationship with fellow mean lesbian, Casey. Jamie’s downstairs neighbours are Jacob and Maggie. Jacob and Maggie have been together since they were teenagers in Britain. Jacob moved to LA to pursue a career in screenwriting and Maggie followed him. After Jamie and Casey’s most recent breakup, Maggie offers her comfort, alcohol and friendship. Jamie nicknames her Magic and the two develop a very close friendship. A very close friendship.

What really works about Girls Like Magic is the dialogue. This film is great at providing characterization and backstory through natural-feeling conversations. Jamie and Casey’s breakup is effectively used to display Jamie’s flaws as a person and her relationship to her parents. Jamie and Magic’s drunken escapades also lead to honesty that moves both the story and characters forward. The dialogue here is not filler. It’s always advancing story and character. There’s a good level of successful jokes in the dialogue as well.

This is a film that also feels like it was made by members of the actual queer community. And specifically, someone who’s a part of the WLW community. Girls Like Magic knows its queer stereotypes. When Jamie and Magic go to a lesbian bar, they encounter so many classic lesbian trope characters. It’s obviously played up for comedy, but I recognize all of these lesbian subcategories. This is comedy based on truth. And it works because there’s a deeper level to this fictional lesbian community. It’s not just pointing at a woman in a baseball cap and going “look, a sports gay.” Girls Like Magic understands the ever elaborate dynamic of the lesbian community. Everybody knows each other a little bit. And everyone’s dated everyone or dated someone’s ex. This is a complicated web of cliques and drama that doesn’t often get discussed in sapphic cinema.

The world in Girls Like Magic is not entirely kind. For a romantic comedy, this is a film with some darkness. The third act certainly gets emotional. It features affairs and forced outing. But though the world is not always nice, there’s always a sense of humour. Some comedy films don’t feature characters in universe reacting to jokes. Girls Like Magic is not such a film. Jamie and Magic make jokes to and about one another. And characters laugh when something is funny is. None of the third act drama renders Jamie and Magic unable to find their happy ending. Especially because the two share a sense of humour. Their relationship allows them to see the world in a more positive, or at least, more humorous light.

I like a romantic comedy with a bit of a bite to it. Girls Like Magic has that. This runs through classic romcom tropes as well as classic queer fiction tropes. It holds together due to a script that has great dialogue and a sense of humour, even about darker topics. Realistically flawed as they are, Magic and Jamie are easy characters to root for as individuals or as a pair. Overall, this makes Girls Like Magic a successful queer romantic comedy.

Overall rating: 6.6/10

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