Tonight, while most of the rest of the country went to see the newest installment of the Star Wars series, I went to see “Lady Bird”, the writing and directing project of “usually the actress” Greta Gerwig.

The film is autobiographical of Gerwig’s hgh school years, when, growing up in Sacramento, California, all she could think about was getting away from her “wrong side of the tracks” family and out of her hometown, “the Midwest of California.” Yearning for the glitz of the big city, Lady Bird (which our protagonist christens herself when she wants to eschew her given first name) wanders through these challenging years as a student at a Catholic school, where she chafes at the school’s caricatured codes for excellence and conduct, striving instead to win key friends as she is trying to find herself through connections with classmates. She is at times strong willed and at times confused, here confident, there quarky, and all along the way, fighting her hen-pecking mother who worries incessantly about family finances, and by extension, the family. Lady Bird wants her mother’s kindness and yet rebels against her excessive nit-picking and nagging by making dumb decisions. Her father, a kindly, thick-bearded and bespectacled man, is quiet and struggles with depression after a job loss, but he dotes on his daughter, and subtly supports her in this strange period of her life and development.

As high school ends, Lady Bird has a miracle happen and she is admitted to a New York City university, a prestigious institution in the hub of glitz and glitter, and somehow, despite their dire financial situation, her parents come up with the funds to send her across the country to go to college. And once she is there, far away from home, she realizes how important her hometown, and especially her mother, were to her.

The screenplay is well-written. It is momentarily funny, and then sentimental, and then serious, and then sober, and there are some wonderful lines within it that sink in to you like the heat of a warm rag on your face. In one moment, Lady Bird talking to a nun she had played a somewhat mean practical joke on, for which she is now confronted, and for which the maturing student apologizes. The nun then turns to talk about how the girl is doing better in school. She is paying more attention to things. To which the nun reflects something like: “Maybe there is little difference between the two, love and attention. Maybe they are the same thing.” And the comment is on the heels of watching Lady Bird’s mom get on her for something or other that seemed excessive.

The film got 99% on Rotten Tomatoes, and it was really pretty good. It is even, consistently entertaining, and gives you plenty of moments to feel through, throwing you back to the awkward moments of being young and trying to fit in, or appear that you do, when you are not sure what you are trying to fit into. It is a project that hits the mark in pretty much every scene, and it ends strongly.

Lady Bird realizes she loves her home.

Like many of us also realized when we shipped out and on into the struggles of growing up and becoming adults, which happens when we leave home.

And we all can identify with having had to leave home.