Film

Adult Life Skills

Name: Adult Life Skills
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Released: 2016
Cast: Jodie Whittaker, Lorraine Ashbourne, Brett Goldstein, Rachael Deering, Eileen Davies

Coming-of-age
Slow-burning

A tender comedy about a woman in her late twenties stuck in arrested development, living in her mum's shed and making thumb films. Jodie Whittaker is luminous as someone quietly fracturing under the weight of expectation. It's warm and wise without being sentimental—about how we get unstuck, and who helps us do it. For anyone who's felt too old to be this lost, and too lost to be this old.

TMDb rating

3.1

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like small, awkward comedies about a stalled person who is funny mostly by accident, where the laughs come from embarrassment and the quiet tenderness is earned slowly.

Skip it if you need brisk plotting or a clear sense of direction, since this drifts, leans on mumbled small talk, and lets scenes sit longer than their jokes deserve.

What it asks of you: Its shape is unhurried: 96 minutes of small rooms, long pauses and days that barely move, paying off through accumulation rather than plot.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Hunt for the Wilderpeople2016

A New Zealand film about an unlikely friendship between a crusty old man and a foster kid. Features the same generous humour about misfits finding family, plus Taika Waititi's gift for making loneliness feel earned rather than cute.

But Spends a lot of time in the bush; if you want a film that moves quickly rather than sits with its characters, this will feel slow.

Eighth Grade2018

Bo Burnham's debut about a girl on the cusp of adolescence. The mortification is sharper and the settings are contemporary, but it has the same tender eye for people caught between versions of themselves.

But Cringe comedy involving real social media footage; if secondhand embarrassment is your kryptonite, you'll spend chunks of it wincing.

Never Let Me Go2010

Jodie Whittaker herself, in a deeply moving drama about accepting fate. A different register entirely—sombre, almost meditative—but the same quiet power in her refusal to perform resilience.

But Emotionally heavy. This is not a film to cheer you up; it's a film to sit with something difficult.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Adult Life Skills

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Chungking Express1994

Both films treat being adrift as an aesthetic and emotional state worth dwelling in. Characters orbit each other gently rather than colliding; connection emerges from proximity and attention rather than dramatic gestures.

Wong Kar-wai's Hong Kong masterpiece about two cops processing heartbreak and displacement through urban wandering and odd encounters. Like Adult Life Skills, it finds poetry in stuckness and small human connections—but through visual rapture rather than English realism.

But Demands patience with style over plot. If you watch for story momentum, the film's gorgeous aimlessness will frustrate you.

Phoebe in Wonderland2008

A girl struggling with identity and parental pressure finds solace in performance and imagination. Shares the blend of whimsy and real pain, and the sense that growing up involves learning which parts of yourself to keep.

But The magical-realism elements are uneven; it lurches between registers in ways that sometimes feel confused rather than deliberate.

Appropriate Behavior2015

About an adult woman reassessing her relationship with her mother and her past. The tonal balance of humour and hurt is almost identical, and it has real patience for the complicated ways families hold us back.

But Quite stagey in its dialogue; feels like a chamber play adapted for film, which some will find theatrical rather than cinematic.

A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence2014

A film about loneliness, possibility, and the strange ways we fill our days. Surreal and deadpan in a way that shares Adult Life Skills' compassion for people slightly out of step with the world.

But Swedish existential comedy with almost no plot. If you need conventional story structure, this will feel like watching paint dry.

A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence poster

Bushwhacked1995

An adult and a kid become unlikely allies in the wilderness. It's a broad comedy but it has real warmth underneath the slapstick, and genuine interest in how two lost people help each other find their way.

But Extremely 90s and broad; the humour lands hard and lands often, which can feel dated or heavy-handed depending on your tolerance.

The Fundamentals of Caring2016

Paul Rudd as a caregiver and a disabled teenager road-tripping toward self-discovery. Same year as Adult Life Skills, same gentle conviction that broken people can help each other, though this one goes bigger and wider.

But Netflix feel; tries to earn every moment of sentiment, which sometimes tips into treacle. The third-act resolutions can feel too neat.

Boyhood2014

Both reject the idea that adulthood has a finish line. They're about learning to live with incompleteness rather than achieving resolution. The friendships matter more than the plot.

Richard Linklater filmed the same cast over 12 years to create a portrait of becoming adult. It's expansive where Adult Life Skills is intimate, but shares the same unhurried belief that growing up is mostly small moments of understanding.

But Three hours of people talking. No crisis, no inciting incident—just a life. The entire enterprise feels pretentious to some people, and they're not entirely wrong.

Son of Rambow2007

Both centre on a scrappy creative project as the engine of connection and self-discovery. Making things together is how both films suggest we survive loneliness.

A lonely boy and a chaotic teenager bond over making a Super-8 film. Like Adult Life Skills, it's about outsiders using imagination as survival. But it's visual and kinetic where Adult Life Skills is intimate—shot through with genuine anarchic joy.

But Hyperactive and visually busy; the aesthetic is deliberately exhausting. If you want contemplative, this will feel like being pelted with energy.