Pizza

"Pizza" is a sweetly droll portrait of the impact two disparate people have on each other over one night in a small town.

Writer/director Mark Christopher brings to bear some of the freshness of the likes of "Napoleon Dynamite," "Me and You and Everyone We Know" and MTV's "Daria." He is particularly good at capturing the dialog, rhythms and social interactions of teens and post-adolescents.

Kylie Sparks as "Cara-Ethyl" is the stand out in carrying the film with her twixt childhood and adulthood 18th birthday girl, quickly switching from big sister knocking down an annoying little brother (exceptionally foul-mouthed, but believably played) to painfully trying to fit in with the high school in crowd to wisely sizing up her companion for the night. She is funny, poignant and moving. She's so good as the chubby, bespectacled outsider that it was unnecessary to have a poster from the musical "Hairspray" shown over and over behind her during a karaoke number.

Ethan Embry as 30-year-old "Matt Firenze" the pizza delivery guy she latches on to takes surprising directions in self-discovery; he charmingly is not a stereotyped hunk as he learns to move beyond that comfortably easy role. The film ends up being more about him finally learning to grow up, even as it is realistic about their relationship.

It's nice to see Jesse McCartney satirize his usual pop image, even in a tiny role, while the casting of rail thin Alexis Dziena unintentionally supports the commentary on Hollywood images of teens as she's gone on to star in ABC's "Invasion." The point is nicely demonstrated how everyone is striving, inappropriately, to be in an older in crowd.

Too bad the adults are so broadly drawn as to bring down the film, particularly Julie Haggerty's temporarily blinded mother, even though the film ironically recalls her classic encounters in Albert Brooks's "Lost in America." And why is she carrying around that hairbrush?

Overall, the success of the film is because the characters are neither sentimentalized nor patronized. They make mistakes and they don't always do the right thing, but somehow they learn something through a night of delivering pizzas.

The interstitial animations that play off pizzas are cute.

The Wilton, PA filming locations are very effectively used to convey small town life.

Pizza (2005) *1/2

Some independent movies are independent for a reason - they're just not very good. Their creators just have to get it made; in their mind it is a good movie. "Pizza" is one of those movies. Its not one of the worst movies I've ever seen, but then again I've seen a lot of movies. The acting is sub-par, and the dialogue is inane and thinks it reaches a level of importance that it misses by a mile. Mark Christophers writing is bad, but i'm not sure which is worse, the script of the direction. Its hard to criticize the actors when their given such hackneyed dialogue. Somewhere in here there is a noble message about confidence in yourself no matter who you are, but its too skewed to really be of any significance.

Now, I didn't hate this movie, i did laugh a couple times and i felt bad for Kylie Sparks character a couple times, but still incredibly annoyed by her the rest of the time. If this movie were just a little bit worse, it might be one of those deliciously bad movies, but its at that unfortunate state of poor quality where it gains nothing from itself. There is something to be said of about being quirky and awkward, think of the films of Wes Anderson or Punch Drunk Love, which are very well made. But there is also something to be said about being quirky and awkward in a self congratulatory and poorly made film. Pizza falls into the latter category.

1.5/4

"Pizza" is full of fun surprises. I felt a steady stream of laughter throughout, even though there were moments that broke my heart. You can't help but fall in love with the 2 main characters, as well a number of the minor ones. I think that anyone who sees this movie will see a bit of themselves in them. It seems to me that the plus-size young actress who plays CaraEthyl (Kylie Sparks)should take great pride in her performance. I understand she is new on the movie scene, but oh so convincing. You can't help but love her. The music is great, takes you on quite a ride all the way to the end of the credits. Its a must see.

Seven years after his ambitious attempt at depicting the high life of the mid-70's Manhattan disco scene in "54", writer-director Mark Christopher has come back most modestly with this elliptical low-budget 2005 coming-of-age comedy that seems to be a cross between a 1980's John Hughes movie and "Napoleon Dynamite". It actually plays out a bit like a teen version of Martin Scorsese's "After Hours" as it follows two disparate characters on an all-night adventure hinging on a series of pizza deliveries. The focus is on a lonely overweight girl, Cara-Ethyl (obscurely named after Irene Cara and Ethel Mertz from "I Love Lucy"). A social outcast forced to make up an imaginary friend to appease her temporarily blinded mother, Cara-Ethyl celebrates her 18th birthday with lots of food but no one to share in the festivities.

Enter Matt Firenze, a thirty-year old failed political activist with his own pizza delivery truck and a prolific track record with women but little else to show for himself. He feels sorry for her plight and invites her on his runs for the night. While Matt attempts to give her lessons on self-acceptance, Cara-Ethyl inevitably experiences deeper feelings that lead to revelations about both their lives. The idea is sound if rather unoriginal, but Christopher's off-kilter, episodic approach feels contrived for all the wrong reasons in spite of a smattering of well-earned laughs. Kylie Sparks certainly gets all of Cara-Ethyl's eccentricities and precociousness down pat, but her character is conceived in ill-fitting clichés over how an awkward, friendless teen finds her identity. As Matt, a cast-against-type Ethan Embry has moments of resonance, but he mainly appears to be channeling Matthew McConaughey's laconic slacker in "Dazed and Confused". The two leads never seem to gel since the contrivance of the situation is too overwhelming.

Familiar faces show up in the supporting cast - Julie Hagerty with her eyes excessively bandaged as Cara-Ethyl's not-so-clueless mom, Marylouise Burke (Paul Giamatti's drunken mother in "Sideways") as Aunt Grandma, and Alexis Dziena (Sharon Stone's oversexed daughter in "Broken Flowers") as a hairball-producing tart. The film clips by quickly at eighty minutes, and I have to admit some of the music used was entertaining - a karaoke number from "Bye Bye Birdie", Lulu's throaty voice on "To Sir With Love" in a strangely disco-oriented club, and Embry's plaintive guitar number. With middling picture quality due to the digital filming, the 2006 DVD has a few extras worth noting. With some help from producer Howard Gertler, Christopher provides unobtrusive commentary on an alternate track and on an eight-minute featurette about some of the scenes.

Pizza was publicly screened for the first time at the Los Angeles Film Festival on the 21st.

It's no overstatement that this is a film I've been hoping for ever since I first sat down and watched "The Breakfast Club," all those years ago. Like master teen storyteller John Hughes himself, Pizza bring Teen cinema to a height that few are aware it can achieve. It's not a bunch of teens wandering around, pretending to cry, trying to have sex with each other. It's not an excuse to show off a pair of breasts.

It's just an honestly honest movie.

Pseudo-hunk Ethan Embry delivers with power I had no clue he had in him. Honestly, watching Ethan Embry in Sweet Home Alabama and watching Ethan Embry in Pizza, they look the same, but you get the feeling you're looking at the NOT evil twin. Newcomer Kylie Sparks (who was, very humbly, at the screening I attended) shines wonderfully as the overweight, mal-adjusted, teetering on the brink of adulthood lead, like Ricki Lake before her. Actually, I take that back, she's BETTER than Ricki Lake.

Pizza remains fresh and entertaining throughout. If perhaps it does fall into the "I love you, I hate you, I love you, I hate you" thing a little too much, it manages to tell a story of love and finding yourself without getting preachy, without copping out.

At the screening, writer/director Mark Christopher mentioned current plans to do a horror flick and a family/farm flick next, but if we're lucky, he'll come the way of teenybopper angst just one more time before he gives it up completely.

If it gets distribution, which it should, I'll definitely see it again.

9/10