Licorice Pizza

Oh Paul Thomas Anderson. Ever since the master your films have been on a slight down tick. The performances are great from all the new comers and the vets. The camera work and cinematography are stellar. Also the score is very good.

But as for the story, this is very poor. It's aimless in its vision and just seems to be random scenes written for the 2 leads to be a part of. The situations they get into are all over the place and there no real feel for how much time is passing from scene to scene. It feels as if the film is a sitcom from the 90s stretched out into a 2 hour film.

I love Paul Thomas Anderson but this is his second worst for me after Inherent Vice. Which isn't to say it's bad. I had a good time watching the film it's just not very memorable and not PTA at his best. I'll be waiting for the next film though without a doubt..

I had great expectations for this film and I have to say that I was disappointed. Although the 70s vibes helped me travel back in time and the direction and photography were great, the plot and the performances were weak. There was no evolution of the characters, their relationship was shallow without a sign of deeper connection. It was a movie that didn't touch me at all. I couldn't relate to any of the protagonists and I wasn't even inspired.

"Licorice Pizza" tells a meandering journey of two young lovebirds. Things happen in the film, but I don't find the events of the plot intriguing or interesting. I honestly was bored by it.

I love this movie but can't explain why, left the cinema same way I felt after watching "Once Upon A Time In Hollywood". Don't really know what to say apart from I enjoyed it. Was it the era it's based in, was it the chemistry the characters shared, was it the way it was filmed, the dialogues, or was it the idyll charm Alana and Gary created? I don't know. It felt like the writers just started writing with no actual plot line, let the story flow and develop on it's own, because I can tell you what happened in the movie but don't really know what the movie's about yet it was still perfect the way it was. Felt like just watching life unfold for the characters. It wasn't complicated, at no point do you feel the script was altered to make it more witty, funny or dramatic, everything was just natural. I think more movies like this should be made. I wasn't around in the 70's, but movies like this make it feel like I'm right there with them; nostalgia to a time I never knew. Come to think of it, maybe that's why I do love it.

A total vibe movie that you're either going to enjoy or not depending on how into that vibe you are.

Paul Thomas Anderson's latest is a nostalgic romcom of sorts about a teenager and the much older woman he wants to have a romance with in 1970s California. The film is obviously made by someone with first-hand experience of what it was like to grow up near L. A.'s entertainment industry, and the film, which is more a series of vignettes than a continuous narrative, captures the weirdness, desperation, and sometimes scariness of famous people living in a vacuum.

The film's biggest asset is Alana Haim, playing either a 25 year old or 28 year old (a blink and you'll miss it line throws some doubt on her actual age) who's oppressive Jewish household makes the antics of a child star high schooler (Cooper Hoffman, son of Phillip Seymour) at first a welcome distraction and later leads to an endearing bond between the two. The movie is winsome and enjoyable as long as it focuses on these two and their prickly relationship, but it's derailed by two lengthy segments featuring Sean Penn and Bradley Cooper that aren't as funny as Anderson seems to think they are and flab out the film's running time.

Also, much as I enjoyed the film while watching it, I couldn't shake an extreme feeling of ickiness when I started to think back on it. The age difference between Haim and Cooper is treated as mostly a non-issue within the world of the film, and their romance is served straight up -- we're obviously supposed to be rooting for them to be together. But if this were a movie about a 25 year old man romancing a 15 year old girl, it would play quite differently, and the double standard bothered me. I also felt like the script let Haim down. She's so likable and such a good actress that I was disappointed her character didn't have more growth. She's a young woman who hasn't seen much of the world but starts to thanks to Hoffman, but I wish the movie had been more about her learning that, much as she likes Hoffman as a friend, she's too old for him and has more potential than that of being his girlfriend and sidekick.

So, overall a mixed bag of a movie for me, though I was entertained watching it and would recommend it to others.

Grade: A-