Big Girls Don’t Cry Review (2026 BFI Flare)

Some sounds you never forget. They immediately take you back in time to a particular place in your life. And in Big Girls Don’t Cry, the high-pitched hiss of a dial-up internet connection takes you straight to those pre-broadband days when using a computer meant your landline was fully occupied and phones were less than smart. For the film’s teenagers, living in rural New Zealand in the early 2000s, it’s the best way of staying in touch with friends and trying to make new ones as they start to explore their sexuality.

That sound regularly punctuates the film, coming close to being something of a soundtrack to this coming-of-age story. It’s the lazy days of the summer holidays, but, as this is New Zealand, they also include Christmas and New Year. Fourteen-year-old Sydney (Ani Palmer) – “Sid” to her friends – is becoming increasingly interested in sex but, finding the internet more sleazy than supportive, turns to real life and starts hanging out with a group of older teenagers. Unable to express her feelings, even though she knows her genuine inclination is towards other girls, she finds the group norms push her towards boys, unappealing as they are.

While it treads familiar ground, Big Girls Don’t Cry marks a double debut that brings a welcome freshness to the narrative and its characters. In her first screen role, Palmer beautifully conveys the agony of that confusing limbo between childhood and adulthood. Desperate to fit in, Sid attempts to make friends with the older, self-assured Lana (Beatrix Wolfe), but she already has a best friend, so the younger girl is constantly stuck in the uncomfortable position of being the add-on who’s barely tolerated. So desperate is she to run with the cool girls that it could be tattooed on her forehead. In typically teenage fashion, she already has a best friend, the down-to-earth Tia (Ngataitangirua Hita), who she pushes to one side in favour of raucous parties, dope and body piercings, and very nearly loses her.

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For her first feature, writer/director Paloma Schneideman creates a world of intense but unspoken emotions, the yearning to belong and the desire to be cool – physically and otherwise – with a remarkably sure and sensitive hand. Her portrait of teenage group dynamics will bring back memories for anybody watching the film, in much the same way as the sound of that internet connection, so that we recognise aspects of ourselves in either Sid or her “friends”. But she cleverly mixes it up with touches of humour that teeter on the verge of the ridiculous, encouraging us to laugh at our younger selves.

Many of those laughs come from the film’s inevitable adult, and he very nearly steals the show from under the turned-up noses of the younger members of the cast. He’s Leo (Edge Of Tomorrow‘s Noah Taylor), Sid’s scruffy, balding father who has a chip on his shoulder the size of Mount Cook. Angry at being forced to give up art to make money doing lawn maintenance, he’s less than attentive to his daughter and oblivious to the one thing she really wants – love. Everything goes wrong for him, and his frustration at the world’s apparent conspiracy to mess up his life produces regular outbursts of anger. Yet there’s a pathos in his rants and, as the narrative moves forward, it’s clear that there’s more to him than the opening scenes imply, and more similarities between father and daughter than he would care to admit. Taylor’s outstanding in the role and, when he’s not on screen, you can’t wait for him to come back.

Big Girls Don’t Cry might not be the most original of coming-of-age stories, and there are times when it takes things a little too slowly, but by the time the final half hour arrives, you realise how deeply you’re invested in Sid’s efforts to be cool and her many missteps along the way. It’s crept up on you almost imperceptibly. She hates the thought of the summer drawing to a close, and you can’t bear the thought of the credits rolling. You just want to see her get through this stage of her life as safely as possible. But she’s already starting to learn that life doesn’t always work that way.

★★★★

At BFI Flare on March 26^th, 28^th and 29^th (UK release date to be confirmed) / Ani Palmer, Rain Spencer, Noah Taylor, Ngataitangirua Hita, Beatrix Wolfe, Poroaki Merritt-McDonald / Dir: Paloma Schneideman