About a year ago, I discovered “The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love” (1995), a beautiful independent romance film written and directed by a fellow Smithie, Maria Maggenti ’86 which tells the story of how two teenage girls fall in love with each other.
The first time I watched it, the movie moved me so much with its beautiful storytelling that I had it on repeat for three days in a row. The girls in the movie became my beacons of hope, their love for each other, my lighthouse leading me to a place of happiness and safety one can perhaps only feel when they are “home.”
Each time I rewatched it, I left feeling a sense of regained appreciation for “radical” portrayals of love, and respect for how revolutionary this movie must have been when it came out in 1995. So, here I am now, sharing my discovery with you all, so that you too may indulge yourselves in this beautiful love story.
There is Randy, a white “tomboyish” working-class girl, living with her gay aunts in their hippy “lesbo household,” and then there is Evie, a Black girl from a much more affluent background, living with her single mother. Randy and Evie have very different backgrounds and interests, but the movie portrays this in a way which successfully avoids resorting to stereotypes or racialised movie clichés.
“The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love” also steers away from using overused tropes in queer media. (The script neither kills nor tragically outs any of its characters against their will. And, although the movie’s ending is left open-ended, it is not necessarily an ill-fated one!). Instead, the movie offers its audience tender moments of queer life and joy. The girls exchange letters, music and writing; they lie on fields and spin in circles holding hands. They spend heartfelt moments together contemplating adulthood and their future selves as they read passages from Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass.” (This iconic book of poetry is heavily referenced throughout the film, serving as a delightful point of comparison for queer love(s) in literature.)
In short, the movie paints a picture of a real kind of pure love, that is, perhaps as such loves should be: joyful, and not shied away from. In fact, the movie prioritizes this love between the girls so much that its refreshing emphasis on joyful love extends even to moments of uncertainty in the movie. “Dear diary, today I kissed another woman. The question now is what will I do?,” Evie writes following the couple’s first kiss. This introspective moment stands out as an honest portrayal of one’s first experiences in life, making it nearly impossible to watch without beaming.
Similarly, when the girls naively wonder if they will still know each other when they are grown up; they lovingly admit that they hope so, despite it feeling “so far from now.” Maggenti’s script has the girls confront the realities of transitioning into adulthood and the uncertainties of life that lie beyond high school, but certainly not at the price of their love. In fact, I think that the loving honesty with which the script was written turns such moments of uncertainty into joyful celebrations of love themselves.
“The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love” is a poetic yet accurate portrayal of the universal experience of falling in love — with someone, and then with the things around us in life over and over again. Watching this movie makes you laugh, cry and feel so many emotions at once, that I believe it leaves you feeling more “human” afterwards. It offers hope, connection and inspiration just like a trustworthy companion does, and thus reinstates, in my opinion, our society’s crucial need for more radically loving pieces of storytelling to be made.
* If you too would like to stream “The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love” by Maria Maggenti, then you can find it on Kanopy through the Smith Libraries website.
