Troop Zero
- Director: Bert & Bertie
- Writer: Lucy Alibar
- Producer: Todd Black; Jason Blumenthal; Steve Tisch
CGiii Comment
Just when you least expect it...a little film pops up and gives Little Miss Sunshine a run for its money! Laugh, cry, throw rotten tomatoes at the screen, Troop Zero will grab you by the unmentionables [with a vice-like grip] and have you cheering for the underdog, the downtrodden, the misfit in next to no time.
Mckenna Grace is a star among some other stars...this motley crew have it all and nothing at all, sass and sincerity, pride and poverty, aspiration and ambition, bravado and bladders! Bert & Bertie direct these kids with their individualities and strengths at the forefront...rendering this 'whole' to be much greater than a sum of its parts. These kids are sure-footed enough to stand of the shoulders of giants. Together...we can be not only heroes...but, be those giants [some day] too!
What else can a little film pack in? Hubris and humility, David Bowie, universal urination and a couple of Oscar winners, that's what! And...did we detect a little Sapphic subtext between the Misses?!? Miss Rayleen & Miss Massey...did their opposites ever attract? That's a whole different story!
Let's stick with this story for the time being...Troop Zero does, gives, delivers rebel-rousing emotion. If you ain't bawling your eyes out by the end...then, you might be dead.
Let the children boogie...and, wee!
Trailer...
The(ir) Blurb...
A nine-year-old girl in Georgia has interplanetary ambitions: to get her voice on the Golden Record being shot into space on the Voyager craft. Can her gang of misfit pals, wrangled by Viola Davis, make her dream come true?
In 1977, the Voyager spacecraft was launched into the cosmos with a gold-plated record, conveying a playlist that best represented humanity and the Earth, a message to anyone who might be out among the stars. And, in Troop Zero, quirky nine-year-old Christmas Flint, played by the charismatic McKenna Grace (Gifted; I, Tonya), is set on getting her voice on that recording. Her way in: the 1977 Birdie Scout Jamboree, where a select troop's vocalizing will be featured on the recording. But when rural Georgia's demure Troop 5, led by the judgmental Miss Massey (Allison Janney), won't have her, Christmas must start her own troop—with a down-to-earth Viola Davis by her side—and assemble an unorthodox team, despite Miss Massey's best attempts to disqualify the underdogs. Cue shenanigans and a lively David Bowie-infused soundtrack. Add comedian Jim Gaffigan to the mix as Christmas's hapless attorney father, and Troop Zero promises to be a sweet, silly, family-friendly comedy-drama with a warmhearted message of acceptance and the power of friendship. In their sophomore feature, premiering on the closing night of this year's Sundance Film Festival, female co-directing duo Bert & Bertie bring us an irresistibly fun and touching celebration of unconventionality.
Cast & Characters
Mckenna Grace as Christmas Flint
Viola Davis as Miss Rayleen
Allison Janney as Miss Massey
Jim Gaffigan as Ramsey
Mike Epps as Dwayne Boudraux
Edi Patterson
Charlie Shotwell as Joseph
Maureen Brennan as Miss Delilah
Milan Ray as Hell-No
Ashley Brooke as Piper Keller
Eric Bell Jr. as School Kid
Zach Mooney as School kid
Gwendolyn Mulamba as Miss Penny
Kenneth Wayne Bradley as Big Eddie
Johanna Colón as Smash