3/5 stars

Who says men can’t get in touch with their feminine side? In Richard Day’s “”Girls Will be Girls,”” three men beautifully play the parts of the three main female characters. You will watch three actresses at different levels on the Hollywood food chain endure the traumas of love, aging and ambition. However, this is no ordinary melodrama where you’re left with a vague sense of pity for the characters and nothing more. Through its brilliantly conceived characters and original sets, the film succeeds in being wonderfully absurd.

The expectation that the female roles are going to be played in an exaggerated way is completely squashed by the actors’ completely natural talent. In simply observing and accurately reproducing women’s facial expressions and physical gestures, the men create a delightful, yet odd spectacle. They are aided by a caustic script that does not allow for any deviant interpretations.

The movie is about three roommates: Evie (Jack Plotnick), an aging actress with an alcohol problem; Coco (Clinton Leupp), who longs for romance and a child with the doctor who performed her abortion; and Varla (Jeffrey Roberson), a plump and overly perky young country girl with an eating disorder, who arrives in Hollywood and almost immediately becomes a prostitute. The movie tracks each of these women, but Evie ‹ sexually ravenous and repellent, cruelly ambitious but completely past having any kind of career ‹ is writer-director Day’s best fabrication. Through the characters and dialogue, this film succeeds in being full of satire, irony and subtle jabs at the general behaviors and ways of thinking of men and women.

Aesthetically, the movie is very engaging. “”Girls Will Be Girls”” is designed to look like it is right out of the ’70s, with the bright colors, pop-art references and equally distinctive clothes. Certain scenes at the end will leave you questioning the sanity of the graphics people working on the film. However, the sets ground the film in reality (albeit a very bizarre one) and let the viewer know that these psychotic characters really do exist on this planet. It is a paradox that, in overdoing everything, the film attains an impressive balance.

Overall, “”Girls Will Be Girls”” is worth seeing if you are in the mood for something slightly out of the ordinary. The laugh-out-loud dialogue, neurotic characters and cool visuals will not be a let down. A huge plus to the film is that the director knew when to end it. At 82 minutes, the movie is short and sweet, and well worth the inflated price of a movie ticket.

“”Girls Will be Girls”” will be an exclusive engagement for one week at the Landmark Ken Cinema starting Oct. 24.