Luckiest Girl Alive

Kunis plays Ani FaNelli, a have-it-all magazine journalist close to landing her dream job at the New York Times and marrying her wealthy boyfriend Luke (Finn ...

But “Luckiest Girl Alive” falls short of its promise, a reminder that, however ironic the title is intended to be, fortune tends to favor the bold. As constructed, unfortunately, in an adaptation of the book written by its author, Jessica Knoll, and directed by Mike Barker, “Luckiest Girl Alive” feels as if it’s juggling too many plates – joining the story in progress and laboring to connect the mass shooting to Ani’s story in a way that muddles the mystery. [Mila Kunis](https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/24/world/mila-kunis-stand-with-ukraine-cnnheroes/index.html) produces and stars in this #MeToo-tinged story, which awkwardly incorporates a mass school shooting as well as gender and class politics into what becomes an ungainly mix of hot-button issues in one dramatic package.

Luckiest Girl Alive not only dramatizes a school shooting in poor taste, it has the gall to use one as the backdrop while it also exploits rape trauma in ...

Ordinarily this moment in a film would feel triumphant, but it’s here you realize “Luckiest Girl Alive” has exploited both school shootings and rape trauma for a self-actualization narrative that ultimately ends with Ani finding value not in the release of her repressed emotions through this writing, but in the shallow achievement of viral fame. Through flashbacks and Ani’s narration (which is haphazardly deployed throughout as her cynical inner thoughts, an interview for a documentary, and the copy for a piece she writes during the film’s denouement), we learn that one of the survivors, now a gun reform activist, claims that Ani was in on the shooting—but also that this same survivor was one of three classmates who gang-raped Ani at a school dance after party just weeks before the shooting. Ani’s wedding dress is from Saks 5th Avenue (the one on 5th Avenue!), but she makes it clear to her rich friends that her mother shops at T.J. [Chiara Aurelia](/cast-and-crew/chiara-aurelia)), is a survivor of the “deadliest private school shooting in U.S. [Mike Barker](/cast-and-crew/mike-barker)’s brutal blocking of the rape sequence, Aurelia does a fine job in showing Ani’s pain and resistance during, confusion immediately after, and later hesitation to report due to internalized shame. She’s written “1,500 stories about how to give a blow job” but all she really wants is a job at the New York Times Magazine so she can be “someone people can respect.” Ani is engaged to an old money scion named Luke ( [Finn Wittrock](/cast-and-crew/finn-wittrock), given nothing to do), who is more of a box to check towards Ani’s goal of unquestionable social legitimacy than anything else.

Netflix's "Luckiest Girl Alive" stars Mila Kunis as Ani and Chiara Aurelia as her younger self, an adaptation of the book by Jessica Knoll.

A lot of women and people everywhere are dealing with kind of some of the issues and topics that we touched on in the movie. Part of the reason I wanted to work on this project is that every single person involved is truly incredible and amazing at what they do. Please note that if you purchase something by clicking on a link within this story, we may receive a small commission from the sale. For the first and second days, we worked through the shooting sequence and then we moved on to working on the sexual assault scenes on the third and fourth days. They spent a lot of time having all the kids connect as well and get to know one another. I met with Mike Barker, who’s the director and I was slowly falling in love with the project. A couple of days later, I get a call from my agent and my manager and they’re like, “Hey, so turns out they’re actually canceling your audition.” I said, “What? So anyway, I auditioned, I read the script and I loved it. “I think that I probably belonged in a generation that didn’t have social media.” In her new film, she gets to be. [Netflix](https://stylecaster.com/how-to-change-netflix-region/)’s Luckiest Girl Alive, which is based on the [2015 bestselling book](https://www.amazon.com/Luckiest-Girl-Alive-Jessica-Knoll-ebook/dp/B00UBL1EEE/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?asc_source=web&asc_campaign=web&asc_refurl=https%3A%2F%2Fstylecaster.com%2Fluckiest-girl-alive%2F#038;tag=stylecaster0d-20) of the same name by Jessica Knoll. As an up-and-coming actor with 22 credits already to her name, including Cruel Summer and Tell Me Your Secrets, Aurelia laments the pressure she feels to “have an “I love this song!” she exclaims on the set of her photoshoot with StyleCaster in late September.

"Luckiest Girl Alive" revolves around the perfect life of Ani Fanelli, a writer at a popular women's magazine, engaged to a loving, preppie, financially.

The weight of the past was lifted from her shoulders, and she was free from the guilt that consumed her. Ani knew that she was on financial aid and that her life could go astray if she spoke about the gang rape. Her mother got her a lawyer when she was in school and silenced her before she could ever confide in her what had happened that night. She decided she wanted to be that woman in life, and she went to extremes to be her. Her mother had dedicated her life and money to her daughter’s education, and the fact that she attended a party and consumed alcohol, putting in line all that her mother had sacrificed, would make her furious. Instead, she even apologized to Liam, who was disappointed to learn that Ani was calling the events of the night gang rape. He took her to his residency and requested that she inform her mother, but she refused. When she saw Dean enter the room, she tried to make some excuse to leave, but he held her down and raped her. After Peyton left, Ani managed to stand up and tried to walk, but the boys would not let her escape. She had passed out, and when she came to her senses, she remembered her classmate Peyton making out with her. She was lying on the bathroom floor, unable to stop what was being done to her body. Everything around her was, in a way, pushing her to the edge.

LUCKIEST GIRL ALIVE on Netflix is the adaption of Jessica Knoll's novel, starring Mila Kunis in the all-important lead. Full Movie review >

Luckiest Girl Alive centers on Ani FaNelli, a sharp-tongued New Yorker who appears to have it all: a sought-after position at a glossy magazine, a killer wardrobe, and a dream Nantucket wedding on the horizon. Jessica Knoll wrote the screenplay for Luckiest Girl Alive which is based on her own novel. Mercedes](https://www.heavenofhorror.com/tv/mr-mercedes-renewed-season-2/)), Scoot McNairy ( [True Detective](https://www.heavenofhorror.com/reviews/true-detective-season-3-hbo/)), and the always amazing Jennifer Beals (The Book of Boba Fett). In recent years, he’s worked mostly in TV, where he has directed on everything from The Handmaid’s Tale (12 episodes across three seasons), Broadchurch, and most recently For many reasons, but especially in terms of listening to and seeing young people. Either from knowing similar trauma or the fear of experiencing the same thing. The realism of the story told in Luckiest Girl Alive – from the school shooting to the sexual assault – makes it a very important movie. Mila Kunis is fierce and credible and absolutely steals the show. Mark my words, we’ll be seeing a lot more of Chiara Aurelia in the future. Actually, she was also in [Mike Flanagan’s Gerald’s Game](https://www.heavenofhorror.com/reviews/geralds-game-netflix-2017/), so I keep hoping we’ll see her in one of his Netflix series sometimes soon. Continue reading our Luckiest Girl Alive movie review below. Read our full Luckiest Girl Alive movie review here!

Luckiest Girl Alive's ending brings a satisfying closure to its main character's turbulent journey through trauma. Adapted from Jessica Knoll's debut novel, ...

It shows that she has come a long way from being the people-pleaser that she used to be and now holds her own decisions above everyone else's. By doing so, she brings a full closure to a long upsetting chapter of her life and triggers a new one on her own terms. Finally standing up for herself, Ani uses the recording to prove that she is telling the truth about the school shooting and her traumatic experiences that led up to it. [Connie Britton from Promising Young Woman's cast](https://screenrant.com/promising-young-woman-cast-character-guide-actors/)), is not on her side and her teacher, Andrew, was expelled just for supporting her, she further conceals the truth and keeps it all to herself. [independent true-crime documentary](https://screenrant.com/true-crime-shows-watch-documentaries/) director asks her to recount a school shooting she survived as a teenager and explain why she was accused of being an accomplice in the shooting. Almost all her life, she lives under the shadow of other people's narratives and decisions surrounding what she should do. Even when Dean shows up during her interview with the true crime director, she runs away instead of facing him. As a final nail in the coffin for his plan, Arthur shoots Dean in the leg and asks Ani to get her revenge by finishing the job. When Ani gradually starts confronting her past, little bits and pieces of her backstory reveal that a couple of days before the school shooting, she was sexually assaulted by three boys at a party during her sophomore year. “I want to make people feel like they can talk about it, like they don’t have to be ashamed of it,” she quoted in an interview, highlighting why she opened up about the reality of the darker elements of her novel. While unraveling Ani's narrative, Luckiest Girl Alive purposefully shrouds many elements of her past in mystery and only reveals figments of the traumatic event that shapes her present reality. Her past finally catches up to her when an

The book 'Luckiest Girl Alive' mirrors the movie in most ways. Find out about Mila Kunis' Netflix movie and the novel behind it.

Beware of Luckiest Girl Alive spoilers ahead. Dean offers to advocate for her innocence in the school shooting and bombing plot in exchange for her silence about his sexual assaulting her and apologizes for the rape. Throughout the book, Ani realizes that her fiancé, Luke, hasn't supported her as she came to terms with her assault and trauma. There’s no reason I shouldn’t say what I know." Knoll penned both the novel and the screenplay, which ensured there would be plenty of parallels. In the book Luckiest Girl Alive, Ani participates in the documentary and agrees to meet with Dean. She also killed the shooter at her elite private school to end the horrific attack—but the biggest secret is that she was friends with the shooters, Arthur and Ben. A former Cosmopolitan writer, Knoll is also the author of The Favorite Sister. He later went on to become a celebrated and highly publicized gun safety advocate. Reliving that specific trauma unravels more for Ani—who is forced to confront another harrowing and traumatic incident from her past, as well as the myriad ways her trauma and its aftermath impacted her In the movie adaption of Luckiest Girl Alive, Ani is the survivor of a brutal gang rape. While most famous for her [comedies](https://parade.com/1052919/gwynnewatkins/best-comedy-movies-of-all-time/) like Bad Moms and That '70s Show, Kunis takes a dramatic turn as Ani FaNelli, a magazine editor who escaped a dark past that comes back to haunt her.

Based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Jessica Knoll—who also adapted the screenplay, while Mike Barker directs—Luckiest Girl Alive stars Mila Kunis ...

In the last scene of the film, Ani is stopped on the street by a woman who says she has spent years reporting on Dean and the work he’s done for the gun control movement. She shows the article to Luke, and he’s upset that he didn’t tell her she was doing it. She tells her fiancé she won’t be doing the documentary after all, and will instead write something herself to tell her side of the story. Ani writes an article about the incident and shows it to her editor, who encourages her to make it even more honest. She is just getting to the part where she reveals Dean and Liam raped her when an adult Dean suddenly bursts into the filming and demands to speak to Ani. Tifani is never charged, but she never tells her side of the story… He is furious that Tifani is letting the bullies get away with rape, and urges her to grow a spine. A documentary filmmaker wants to interview her to tell her side of the story. He said that she slept with both Dean and Liam, and went on a revenge rampage after Dean refused to date her. When he confronts Dean, Arthur offers a terrified Tifani the gun and tells her to kill Dean himself. She reports the incident to her teacher, who brings it to the headmaster. But when it all comes bubbling to the surface, she learns how to get her revenge.

Luckiest Girl Alive is based in part on author Jessica Knoll's experiences with gang rape. She spoke to TODAY about adapting the story to the screen.

I thought I had to make it worse." I thought I had to make it worse," she said. "I was so scared," she said. "A lot of that had to do with the fact that I didn't want to make the actors feel uncomfortable," Knoll said. It becomes very, it becomes even harder for her to come forward," she said. Knoll answered in the affirmative. "I think I normalize what happened to me so that I can live with it. "She's now carrying the fact that they are 'good victim.' They've been gunned down. Author Knoll had to do the same. This was really bad." I was like, 'This is a job people need to do and I don't want to make it any more uncomfortable than it needs to be." But you can think of these aspects to her life as armor — or maybe a picnic blanket covering up a crater.

Spoiler alert: This article contains book and movie spoilers for Luckiest Girl Alive. When it comes to putting our traumas behind us, leaving our baggage at ...

It becomes very — it becomes even harder for her to come forward." "I still had the idea in my head that what happened to Ani wasn’t bad enough, because that’s what happened to me. I thought I had to make it worse," she shared. Disturbingly, peers and adults in her life doubted the validity of her story, downplaying the assault as if it were, well, a work of fiction. She finds herself at the center of a school shooting in 1999, which is carried out by two classmates. His phony heroic victim persona makes it more difficult for Ani to come forward with the truth. Though it took much time, processing, and bravery, it's never too late to share your story. When it comes to putting our traumas behind us, leaving our baggage at the door, so to speak, it takes a fierce amount of "fake it till you make it" energy. Ani's engaged to her trust-fund-baby fiancé, Luke (Finn Wittrock), brags about being an anti-children workaholic, and is uber-close to having "the life no one though [she] deserved." For New York Times bestselling author Jessica Knoll, writing her 2015 novel Luckiest Girl Alive allowed her to shed her traumas. Though many aspects of the story are fictionalized, it's somewhat autobiographical. Whether it be via painting, photography, poetry, or writing "fiction," creativity aids in the healing process.

Just because author Jessica Knoll adapted her own book “Luckiest Girl Alive” for the Netflix movie doesn't mean she didn't make some changes — including to the ...

“I — again, kudos to Jess that she was able to create a character that she wasn’t married to necessarily, and loved and created, but also allowed [director] Mike Barker and I to go and innovate and create a new North Star,” Kunis continued. It’s the the idea of your inner voice and your outer voice becoming one, which there’s a metaphor behind that but there’s also the literal moment in the movie where that happens.” “Who [Knoll] was when she wrote the book and her North Star when she wrote the book changed when she was writing the script. She takes the new editor job that her “Women’s Magazine” boss grandfathers her into at “Glow Magazine,” choosing to live a life for herself, and for her past self. “It’s like the cool thing about the juxtaposition of it all where you understand her logic. She also highlighted the clashing of Ani’s different selves that creates such a tense dynamic in the film.

If you finish watching Netflix's Luckiest Girl Alive without feeling as angry as Ani, you didn't watch it right.

It offers a career-best performance from Mila Kunis and isn’t afraid to throw salt in two giant wounds that can’t and won’t heal until we treat them with the seriousness they demand. Ultimately, the movie is a series of punches to the gut, most of which you never see coming. You never know what she’s going to do or say, and once the movie starts wrapping up and makes the core of her behavior clear, you fully understand and relate to the character. On the other hand, men get the benefit of the doubt, excuses are handed to them on a silver platter, and their entire existence is perceived as nuanced – and you definitely can’t pin them to a single mistake in life, because they are much more than that. Not only is this explicitly stated in a flashback by one of Ani’s teachers, but you constantly hear Ani's voiceover contradicting a lot of what she does and says onscreen. Based on a New York Times best-selling novel by author Jessica Knoll (who also pens the script), Luckiest Girl Alive tells the story of a magazine writer who’s aiming to make it to the top rankings of the writing world.