Netflix’s teen drama, Moxie, is adapted from a work of fiction, but the coming-of-age story includes autobiographical details inspired by events from author Jennifer Mathieu’s life, including a connection to the revolutionary Riot Grrrl movement from the ‘90s. In Moxie, high school junior Vivian Carter (Hadley Robinson) stumbles upon her mom Lisa's (Amy Poehler) Riot Grrrl memorabilia, a discovery that marks the beginning of the teen's feminist revolution. Amy Poehler directed and stars in the film and her production company, Paper Kite, produced the adapted feature.
Like the novel, Moxie follows Vivian as she attempts to navigate her way through Rockport High School, where bullying and sexism are accepted as the status quo: this is an institution full of obnoxious jocks, mean girls, clueless teachers, and a willfully ignorant principal. To combat the school’s toxic culture, Vivian anonymously launches her own feminist zine, Moxie!, which calls out the unchecked misogyny and prejudice running rampant through the hallways. Inspired by the zine, more students rally around the cause and eventually come together to start a movement.
Many elements of the story are drawn from Mathieu’s own experiences. Like Vivian, Mathieu has been an outspoken feminist since her high school days in the ‘90s when she too started writing feminist zines influenced by the Riot Grrrl movement. “That’s why I wrote Moxie,” Mathieu said in an interview with CultureMap, “I love riot grrrl, I love feminism, and stories that center on how hard it is to be a teenager.”
In the interview, Mathieu goes on to discuss how the punk rock bands of the ‘90s influenced the story. The Riot Grrrl movement originated in Olympia, Washington, where a group of musicians came together to address issues of sexism in the punk scene. Mathieu cites Sleater-Kinney and Bikini Kill as two of her favorite bands that were associated with the movement and later became known as advocates for equality in the arts. Moxie's soundtrack is full of songs from and inspired by the era. Bikini Kill’s “Rebel Girl” is arguably one of the most iconic songs of the movement. The song plays during the pivotal scene where Vivian first discovers the Riot Grrrl relics from her mother’s rebel past. "Double Dare Ya," another Bikini Kill favorite, is also in the film.
Since its inception in the early ‘90s, Riot Grrrl has been inspiring real-life feminists, artists, and revolutionaries to band together in the name of “girl power” — a slogan initially derived from the pages of the Riot Grrrl zines. Some claim that the Riot Grrrl movement ended when pop stars like the Spice Girls began using the slogan. But Riot Grrrl lives on through the groups that sprang from the original, like the Russian-based collective Pussy Riot that formed in the late '00s. And it continues to inspire smaller spin-offs of the movement like the one Vivian and her friends form in Moxie.