The Starling Girl is a 2023 American coming-of-age drama film written and directed by Laurel Parmet in her feature directorial debut.

Set in a Christian fundamentalist community in Kentucky, it follows Jemima "Jem" Starling (Scanlen), a 17-year-old girl struggling with her religious beliefs as she romantically pursues married missionary Owen Taylor (Pullman).

The Starling Girl premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on January 21, 2023, where it was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize, and was given a limited theatrical release in the United States on May 12, 2023.

She develops a crush on Owen and seeks ways to get closer to the older man, who is supportive of her passion for dance when others tells her she is doing it for vanity and not to praise God.

When Jem asks Owen if he thinks she is wicked, he replies he does not, and reasons that because he feels he can be himself around her, what they are doing can't possibly be a sin.

The website's consensus reads: "Sensitively and intelligently crafted by writer-director Laurel Parmet, The Starling Girl is a well-told coming-of-age story centering around a young woman's struggles with her spiritual faith.

"[15] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 78 out of 100, based on 20 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.

Katie Walsh of TheWrap wrote, "Parmet’s strong script and surety behind the camera navigates the audience through this complicated story of religion and sexuality, patriarchy and power, brought to eerily accurate life by the ensemble of excellent actors.

Scanlen, who is always tremendous, from Little Women to Babyteeth, holds the center with ease, while Pullman proves his chops in this complex role.

But Schmidt (whose accent and cadence is spot on) and Simpson just about steal the show in their supporting roles as the steely, severe Heidi and deteriorating Paul.

"[17] David Ehrlich of IndieWire gave the film a grade of B+ and wrote though the film "tells a tale as old as time — the broad strokes of its story about the affair between a naïve teenage girl and a married older man who swears that he’ll leave his wife adhere to convention from start to finish...the power of this sensitive and devilishly detailed coming-of-age drama is rooted in the friction that it finds between biblical paternalism and modern personhood.

While young women have always been taught to be ashamed of their desires...Parmet’s self-possessed debut is uncommonly well-attuned to how garbled that gospel might sound to a God-loving girl who’s been raised amid the echoes of a secular culture.

"[18] In The Hollywood Reporter, Jourdain Searles wrote, "The Starling Girl is a complex, often disturbing portrait of the way women have been pressured to shrink themselves and pass on that shame to their daughters.

"[19] In The Guardian, Adrian Horton wrote Parmet succeeds in "depicting an insular religious community – a group of fundamentalist Christians in present-day Kentucky – with enough specificity and emotional acuity to bridge the gap with viewers who will find such a place opaque, unrelatable or possibly even unbelievable.

"[20] The Film Stage's Michael Frank wrote, "For those with a religious background, the elements of dread, wielding power over our own upbringing, our own residual guilt that sticks with one long after they’ve stopped going to church will be well-recognized.