Doing the hardest thing and the right thing are both equally as painful.

But, when is it the right time to do the right thing and the appropriate time to follow through with the hardest action that you have to make in your life? Tallulah is a film about differentiating those two convictions.

A few nights ago, I opened Netflix, and my computer had a glitch. Suddenly, it began to play Tallulah. I said the “hell with it” because I love movies. I will watch movies on purpose or an accident by stumbling into them. Boy, let me tell you that this was the best happy accident that I have ever had in a long time.

Ellen Page gives her best performance since Juno, recreating her finest reincarnation of “herself” as the titular Tallulah, a girl named after a bar that her parents met at, not the famous river in Georgia. She plays a free spirited-daring girl who lives out of her van that barely scrapes by that just enjoy’s life; carefree and rent free.
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In short, her boyfriend leaves her for a more stable life, and she decides to follow him to New York City while he tries to reconnect with his estranged mother. While trying to survive in the Big Apple, she stumbles into a fancy hotel room only to find a delusional “sugar mama” with a child, in which she neglects, who swipes her husband’s credit card, consumes severe amounts of alcohol and adulterates. Tallulah seems to be mistaken for a nanny or an employee at the hotel by the “sugar mama” and ends up taking care of the child.The condition that this little girl was left in was terrible. It seemed like this woman didn’t even want her child for cripes sake! After spending a day with the little rugrat, the “sugar mama” stumbles home black-out-drunk utterly unaware that she has a child to come home to.

Do you know what the free-wheeling Tallulah does? She takes the little girl out of fear for the rugrat’s life because she thinks she is doing the right thing. Tallulah knows that she can save this child before she is old enough to be corrupted by her mom. Here, she is doing the hardest thing but, is it the right thing?

​We all can relate to Tallulah in a way because everyone wants to commit to an act of bravery despite the consequences. This film takes you on a twisting reality check of learning the difference between knowing how to act out of courage and justice.

​ After the police are involved, and she is sought out, it is gut check time for Tallulah. She now knows that she can do the hardest thing, but does she know if she is capable of doing the right thing?

Most people in this world don’t even know how to do one or the other.

This film is all about delusion, reality gut checks, and coming of age decision making. I want to point out that the term “coming of age” doesn’t always mean a young person gets to learn something great. It applies to a 50-year-old, a 10-year-old and basically anyone learning to become something on their own of the enlightening issues of who they really are and can be. Coming of age is finding your most genuine potential and becoming your best self. This is what is so great about this film because we see someone do one of the hardest things ever; standing up for what is right even though it is so wrong. What insinuates from this action is an equal reaction from all of the other main characters in the film.

Hence, why the hardest thing and the right thing are the same.

David Zosel
The Cat of Cinema