‘Best holiday ever…’
As a veteran of two tours of Magaluf and one of Zante in my teenage years, I know a thing or two about lads’ holidays. Well, I say I know a thing or two, I know how to duck out of the nightclub early, order a massive kebab and then wait in bed for my mates to come home and wake me up at 5 am. I’ve never really considered what these holidays are like for young women. At 17 I was too wrapped up in my own nonsense to think about anyone else. How to Have Sex does an exceptional job of capturing those formative experiences that makeup one’s first holiday without their family…
Tara (Mia McKenna-Bruce), Skye (Lara Peake) and Em (Env Lewis), three teenage girls on the cusp of leaving school, arrive in Malia looking for sun, sex and sea. Tara is the more inexperienced of the three and we view this experience through her eyes.
Writer-director Molly Manning Walker perfectly captures the cadence and behaviour of teenagers desperately trying to act older than they are. McKenna-Bruce manages to convey the juxtaposition of the confidence of youth and the naivety of childhood and there are moments here in which she really does look and act like a child despite being in her twenties when filming commenced. The film questions what it means to give consent and when that consent stops and both men and women will undoubtedly be familiar with many of the scenarios that unfold here. Across the balcony from the girls is a group of northern lads led by Ladhood alumni Paddy (Samuel Bottomley) and Badger (Shaun Thomas). Walker’s script utilises layers and nuance to examine the evolving relationship between the principal cast but it is McKenna-Bruce’s raw and authentic performance that helps How to Have Sex to encapsulate the highs and horrors of that first big holiday.
In terms of direction, Walker’s clever use of sound and editing mimics the experience of being in a nightclub and the nervous uncertainty about whether it is even a good time in the first place (no, is the answer). As a whole, Walker’s debut film acts as a spiritual sequel to 2022’s Aftersun and as with that film, I left this one with a mixture of wistful nostalgia and endless gratitude that I don’t have to do any of this shit again.
How to Have Sex is a striking and singular film from an exciting up-and-coming filmmaker. A success.