Film Review: Days of Daisy (2022)
Being almost 40 isn’t the end of the world — unless you’re a woman who wants children, like the titular Daisy (Jency Griffin Hogan) in Days of Daisy.
From director Alexander Jeffrey and a screenwriting and producing team which includes Hogan, Days of Daisy is a romcom with the sensibilities of the genre’s early-aughts heyday. Despite its adherence to old tropes, the folks behind the film do bring in more “modern” ideas and make an attempt to turn the romantic comedy on its head.
Daisy is an aimless near 40-year-old, who works as a school librarian at the high school where her dad, Frank (Bill Martin Williams) works as the principal. During a visit to her gynecologist, the doctor informs her that if she wants to have kids, she can’t wait. This leads Daisy to break up with her cowboy boyfriend — who doesn’t want children — while at the same time taking over an art class from a teacher (Sybil Rosen) who quits due to funding cuts and a lack of supplies for the school’s art program.
The film forces these two stories together in a way that doesn’t feel organic or authentic. Daisy contends with her overbearing mother (who invites potential suitors for her daughter to family dinners) while working with dashing photographer and artist Jack Palmer (Bryan Langlitz) on continuing the arts program and planning an art show/charity auction for the art students.
In trying to do too much, Days of Daisy often feels lackluster. There’s so many interesting stories packed into 90 minutes, but none of them are done justice. Daisy is championing a dilapidated arts program, finding a man to marry and have a baby with, planning an art show, dealing with a teen bully, coping with an endometriosis diagnosis, and reacting to the news that Jack was in a horrific car accident. Each of these plot points should serve as major emotional moments in the film, but they’re just another item on Daisy’s docket of bad things to deal with.
The most charming moments of the film come from Daisy’s work with the students, which seems to be her driving force for any of the actions she takes. By the end of the film her time with the art students certainly seems to have paid off as an instrument of personal growth — Daisy finds fulfillment in something she never thought she could.Despite the muddled story, Days of Daisy is a fun, lighthearted film. As Daisy, Hogan gives it her all — portraying the aimless character with both the youthful resistance to stability and adult yearning for settling down. While Hogan and Langlitz have stilted romantic chemistry, their friendship and camaraderie shines through the screen and makes their teamwork on helping the art students one of the most enjoyable parts of the film.
