Director Amy Poehler Sparks a High School Revolution on Netflix

We have a new trailer for Moxie. This is one of Netflix’s many, many original movies coming down the pipeline in 2021. In this case, they have reunited with Amy Poehler (Saturday Night Live, Parks and Recreation) for a new comedy. Poehler not only stars in the comedy but is also behind the camera as the director as well. As we can see from the trailer, Poehler will be shining a light on a group of young women on a journey of empowerment.

The trailer opens with a conversation between Amy Poehler and her on-screen daughter Valerie, played by Hadley Robinson. She wants to know what her mom cared about when she was young, and Poehler proceeds to explain that she was focused on toppling the patriarchy. Valerie, encouraged, and tired of harassment and other events going on at her school, teams with some classmates to launch a zine. It starts a grassroots movement at the school, ruffling feathers and shaking up the distressing norms that had previously been allowed to run rampant. The trailer does not shy away from the fact that this movie will be tackling some prevalent social issues head-on.

Amy Poehler directed the movie, which is based on the novel by Jennifer Mathie. The cast includes Lauren Tsai, Patrick Schwarzenegger, Nico Hiraga, Sydney Park, Josephine Langford, Clark Gregg, Josie Totah, Anjelika Washington, Charlie Hall, Sabrina Haskett, Ike Barinholtz and Marcia Gay Harden. Poehler is known best for her on-screen roles, particularly Leslie Knope from Parks and Recreation. But Poehler has been making a push as a director as of late. She previously helmed Wine Country, also for Netflix, which was released in 2019.

Moxie centers on Vivian (Hadley Robinson), a seemingly shy 16-year-old, has always preferred to keep her head down and fly under the radar. But when the arrival of a new student (Alycia Pascual-Peña) forces her to examine the unchecked behavior of her fellow students running rampant at her high school, Vivian realizes she’s fed up. Inspired by her mother’s (Amy Poehler) rebellious past, Vivian anonymously publishes an underground zine called Moxie to expose bias and wrongdoing in her high school, and unexpectedly sparks a movement. Now at the center of a revolution, Vivian begins to forge new friendships with other young women and allies, reaching across the divide of cliques and clubs as they learn to navigate the highs and lows of high school together.

There is hope that movie theaters will return later in the year. But for the first half of 2021 at least, it is 2020 deja vu. Netflix is capitalizing and filling the void by releasing more than 70 original movies this year. Other entries on the slate include Amy Adams’ long-delayed The Woman in the Window, Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead, Adam McKay’s stacked Don’t Look Up, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s Red Notice and R.L. Stine’s Fear Street trilogy, among many others. Moxie arrives on March 3 on the Netflix streaming service. Be sure to check out the new trailer for yourself.

Topics: Moxie, Netflix, Streaming