Between Reality and Fantasy: ‘Miller’s Girl’ Hits Prime Video

While waiting for Jenna Ortega’s return in ‘Wednesday’ and the sequel to ‘Beetlejuice,’ you’ll have the chance to admire her incredible performance in ‘Miller’s Girl,’ the upcoming film set to premiere very soon on Prime Video. We had the opportunity to watch the film in advance, and here’s what we think:

“Literature is my solace in my loneliness,” confides 18-year-old student Cairo Sweet. Born into a wealthy but unhappy family, Cairo lives alone in her large family home, her parents constantly absent and disinterested in her life. Although left to her own devices, she shows great determination and doesn’t give in easily. So she decides to seduce her high school creative writing teacher, Jonathan Miller, a writer whose career hasn’t taken off and who has turned to teaching, something his wife, Beatrice, constantly reproaches him for. The situation becomes complicated when Jonathan Miller assigns a mid-term homework: write a short story inspired by their favorite author. Cairo obviously chooses Henry Miller purely for the provocative value. The assignment combines a declaration of love to his teacher with pornography.

The contrast between Cairo writing his text and Jonathan reading it in the privacy of his office, each revealing his pornographic prose in turn, is a particularly captivating directorial choice. Jenna Ortega manages to draw us in and keep us on the edge of our seats throughout the film. There’s a strong similarity between Mercredi Addams and Cairo Sweet: both portray thoughtful, disillusioned teenagers who wish the world would just fall apart. This atmosphere is particularly evident at the end of the film. However, the film leaves a feeling of frustration, due to a story and content that seem insufficient. Secondary characters, such as Cairo’s best friend and the professor’s best friend, provide some surprising elements, but are not enough to compensate for the lack of depth. It would have been interesting to see how the main characters met, to understand the evolution of Cairo’s admiration for his teacher and, above all, how Jonathan could have given his pupil such high expectations.

Despite its shortcomings, the story of “Miller’s Girl” managed to captivate us. It leaves behind mysteries and unanswered questions. Are the scenes depicted in Cairo’s mid-term essay real or merely the product of her fantasy? The final scene itself carries a mystery that leaves us speechless. It is precisely this ambiguity that, in our view, makes “Miller’s Girl” a good film.