Aubrey Plaza Sci-Fi Comedy With 90% On Rotten Tomatoes Finds Success On Prime Video

Aubrey Plaza’s newest movie is officially a critical success — which also means the studio behind the super popular film, Amazon, is pretty happy right now. (No, it’s not “Megalopolis,” hard as that may be to believe.)

In “My Old Ass,” we first meet the movie’s protagonist Elliott as her younger self played by Maisy Stella as she prepares to take hallucinogenic mushrooms with her friends; when she does, she “meets” her 39-year-old self played by Plaza (who recently stunned audiences on the Marvel series “Agatha All Along”). When Older Elliott dispenses some advice — including a strangely specific note to stay away from some boy named Chad — younger Elliot is suspicious at first but realizes that following it actually helps her solve some critical problems, so she starts seeking out her older counterpart to try and get through her younger years unscathed. (Also, Elliot can text Older Elliott, and she saves her in her phone as “My Old Ass,” hence the movie’s title.)

“My Old Ass” is funny, unexpectedly emotional, and features two outstanding central performances from Plaza and Stella. Clearly, critics agree; the movie is sitting pretty with a 90% rating on the review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes with a consensus that reads, “A humorous cocktail with a twist of coming-of-age drama, ‘My Old Ass’ doesn’t throw out the wisdom with the reckless abandon of youth and the effects are hallucinogenic.” So what do individual critics think of the film?

The bottom line is that both Aubrey Plaza and Maisy Stella are excellent in “My Old Ass,” and /Film’s own Jeremy Mathai made the argument that director Megan Park, known for “The Fallout,” utilizes Stella particularly well. “The fact that ‘My Old Ass’ feels like so much more than the sum of its parts is due in no small part to Plaza and Stella as its two dynamic leads,” Mathai says before turning his attention to the two stars. “Plaza adds a burst of star power as the older version of our main character, grounding this story in something real and meaningful. But it’s Stella as the teenaged Elliott who’s a legitimate revelation in the double-sided role, practically forcing the hands of Park, director of photography Kristen Correll, and editor Jennifer Vecchiarello to keep the camera trained on her expressive face at almost all times.” 

Kristy Puchko at Mashable agreed, writing, “‘My Old Ass’ is a spirited comedy about growing up and moving on that’s a true joy — just as Stella is a star on the rise to watch.” Similarly, Kate Erland over at IndieWire said the combination of Plaza and Stella is what’s extraordinary: “The bond between Plaza and Stella is strong enough to sell the film’s central big idea with ease — and at The Financial Times, Jonathan Romney praised the duo’s approach to their roles. “It takes all of Plaza’s weird chanting inflections and Stella’s exuberantly twitchy enthusiasm to make it pay off — but it does, with sly charm,” he wrote in his review. Certainly, Plaza and Stella deserve their flowers, but it’s not just their performances that sell the movie as a whole. Critics just really, really liked “My Old Ass.”

Everyone wishes their older self could somehow give them advice about their future — which is probably why “My Old Ass” is connecting with critics and audiences. It seems like it’s just a movie that you want to spend time watching, as David Fear put it in his review for Rolling Stone: “‘My Old Ass’ works best when it’s content to simply be a casual hang-out movie dotted with deep-thought conversations.” Helen O’Hara expressed a similar sentiment for Empire Magazine, saying the movie is “smart, and sharp enough to balance the sweetness of its simple yet profound message. All we have is time, and this film reminds us, movingly, that it matters how we spend it.”

Others remarked that they loved that “My Old Ass” didn’t get into the weeds of exactly how Older Elliott is able to speak to her younger self. “One of the things I love about writer-director Megan Park’s funny and smart and heart-tugging sci-fi comedy/drama/romance is there’s no attempt to explain how it’s possible … it simply happens,” Richard Roeper wrote for the Chicago Sun-Times. Aisha Harris for NPR agreed, saying, “The absence of mystical lore leaves ample space for rich character- and world-building in a tidy 90-minute package.” Allison Willmore may have summed it up best for Vulture, writing, “[Megan] Park’s film is modest, but it’s grounded in the inner terrain of its characters in a way that makes it feel substantial.” 

“My Old Ass” is streaming on Amazon Prime now.