Poms is a shining emblem of the insulting pablum marketed to older Americans that treats them like shallow adolescents incapable of contemplating anything serious without being melodramatic or bringing down the room. I did not expect to love the film, but it could at least be moderately amusing with such an amazing cast and a former documentarian woman director. Nope.
Poms stars Diane Keaton who decides to leave Manhattan and go to a Georgia retirement community to die in peace, but the community requires everyone to join a club. She decides to form her own, a cheer leading squad, which leads to controversy and consternation throughout the community and the squad’s family. Will they get to be in the cheerleading competition?
While Poms’ premise is immediately absurd, it did not have to suck. There are themes of fulfilling goals abandoned earlier in life due to obligations and duties, the never-ending domination of men and lack of agency even at the end of life and the importance of friendships and community among older women. A British film like The Full Monty could pull off the dance of tackling controversial topics by setting it in a light environment where individuals ill-suited to the task decide to form a group and put on a show with tons of humor, popular culture references, especially music to defuse the progressive message and make it seem less preachy. It is as if the people who made this film never even considered other appealing movies as something to emulate, but plucked its concept out of thin air and tried to make it work while having no innate critical taste to act as its compass.
Poms is dreadful. Do not even see it for Pam Grier, who deserves better. Hell, Diane Keaton probably deserved better awhile ago, but if you don’t love yourself, then how can anyone else. The woman who gave us Looking for Mr. Goodbar and Annie Hall now plays a lone prude who somehow made it to retirement age able to detangle herself from any prior associations such as former colleagues, family or friends and just move somewhere without any questions or continued associations. It is as if she appeared in this community fully formed from Zeus’ head on her first day on earth. It is absurd. Also anyone who lived in Manhattan until becoming a senior citizen would never move. The simple suggestion would be an abomination and dismissed. She would have to escape earlier, but let’s say she did, she would not move to a retirement community that she so obviously despises. Did she not go on a tour before?
When Poms’ protagonist arrives at the community, it is as if she just discovered how to make friends, but these are the kind of friendships that get depicted in ads as laughing over salads while wearing white pants and colorful tops. To be fair, Jacki Weaver really tries to make the chemistry work by playing Blanche 2.0, but it is never believable. Naturally a woman is the villain and under-utilizing Celia Weston seems like a crime against humanity. The film could have worked if the film had a different protagonist, Helen, whom Phyllis Somerville plays perfectly as a real human being with a past, present and future, a dry wit personality and something that actually resembles a character arc. Somerville is the best, funniest part of the film.
Poms irritated me because it never even contemplated the possibility that these older women could make an engaging, age appropriate cheer squad that they would enjoy dancing, and we would enjoy watching. Older women’s eyesight may be failing, but presumably they can still see and know what looks good. It is ageist and offensive. I would rather watch Levi’s commercial, Circles, which was released in August 2017 and features Jain’s song Makeba in a loop for ninety minutes than Poms. It features an older Black couple dancing and basically being the epitome of cool among other diverse groups whereas we get Keaton acting as if she should be the choreographer of the group when she clearly has no concept of anything resembling coordination, rhythm or groove. It is ridiculous. Old people can dance so they could cheer if they wanted! Give Jake Nava a movie to direct because he could bring out the interior beauty of everyone who appears on screen instead of secretly treating his subjects as jokes.
I was aggravated that some of Poms’ characters never even talked. Ginny MacColl plays Evelyn, who is really great at yoga, but says nothing and should be better at this extracurricular activity, but the film goes in another direction, which is to say none. Why is this character even in the film?
I love when films explore intergenerational relationships, but Poms fails here too. Kids are mean, and teenage girls have the potential to be monsters, but would teenage girls openly ridicule them? Maybe, but I did not buy it. It felt as if the film wanted to have one young hot actor in the film to attract which demographic when no one should want to see this film? I do not know, but it had the whiff of desperation that only a focus group devoid of any creativity could come up with. I thought that the storyline with a kid secretly living in a retirement community felt more organic because a lot of grandparents are raising their grandchildren, but instead it is another missed opportunity to depict something honest, genuine and fresh.
Does Poms have a good soundtrack? No, I cannot remember one song that I wanted to listen to again after the movie, and a movie about cheerleading should be filled with jams or at least trigger nostalgia. Shania Twain does not count. I should be running to the internet eager to hear a son on repeat. Instead I got The Name of the Game.
If I had to compliment Poms, it would only be to admit that I got a little teary eyed when I saw the single firework at the end. It was the most poignant moment in the movie, and when it occurred, I did not expect it at that exact point so the movie successfully emotionally manipulated me to feel wistful about a character that I actually had no attachment to except as a human being who got what she wanted. It was an abrupt transition in comparison to all the other trite and predictable scenes, which is probably why it worked for me.
I do not know why I keep wasting my time with movies like Poms. I know that in spite of having a delightful cast of actors and an absurd, but not wholly devoid of whimsy premise, it will probably be a bad movie that insults older women yet I keep hoping that Hollywood won’t disappoint me this time. At least I just wasted my time, not my money, but still shame on me for clamoring for what few crumbs they offer. It is living proof that everyone has bills and needs a job. I just wish there was a way to send money to the cast directly. Google the Sun City Poms instead.