90's

Aside from a couple minor issues I had with this film, I loved it. It just felt incredibly real. I didn't feel like I was watching actors. I felt like I was watching the lives of these kids unfold, and that those lives would just continue unfolding even when the camera wasn't rolling.

Mid90s is Jonah Hill's love-letter and confronting examination of a decade we now look back upon with incomparable admiration and respect. It's got everything: skateboards, VCRs, Super Nintendo, Sony PlayStation, Ren and Stimpy t-shirts and gangsta-culture. It's a time-capsule movie that truly doesn't feel like it was made in 2018 at all: its setting and characters are that convincing in making us Belgrave we're back in the 90s. Sure it's not all sunshine-and-bunnies in the story: the main character suffers physical abuse from his older brother and his mother isn't the most accepting person on the planet, but the movie's exploration of camaraderie, sex and drugs and rock and roll, VidCam filmmaking, skateboards and no longer feeling like an outsider makes Mid90s quite the visual and story-based treat.

This film is a short and ridiculously sweet nostalgia trip for anyone wanting something simple, relatable and honest.

When I first saw the trailer for this movie months back it was hard to not see some similarities from Larry Clark's teenage slice of life movies from the late 90s and early 2000s. Once I saw the movie I was pleased to see while some parts may be influenced by Clark, the Mid 90s stands on its own as true winner.

Much like Clark did, Hill has brought in some kids who have no acting experience here to play Stevie's crew. They all really knock it out of the park and add to the sense of realism. The film is short and sweet setting up the main points quickly and then taking some great turns, some of which are a bit dark. I was a big fan of Lucas Hedge's character and how the dynamic of him and Stevie plays out. The soundtrack also is really quite amazing and adds a lot to the film in some scenes. Also Mid 90's may have the best jump scare of the year!

Some people may complain that while the film does have good characters, setting and so on, it lacks a standard plot. While this is true I'd argue that it sets out to tell the story of Stevie in a realistic fashion and gets the job done. While Mid 90s does have some shortcomings like some cliches and some heavy predictability, I didn't feel like they hindered the film much. A strong 8/10.

Where "Jonah Hill" places his characters, the way they speak, his direction. All of this speaks to me, cus a lot of us lived through moments like this. The love on display, carrys through any contrivances that you expect from a film like this.

The reason I wanted to check this film out was because of Jonah Hill. It's interesting to see actors give a shot at directing, writing or even both and for a first feature, Hill doesn't disappoint.

Mid90s follows Stevie, a young kid with a troubled family life, and finds a group of friends at a skate shop during the... mid 90s obviously.

If there is one thing that's executed extremely well, then it's the authentic feeling of the 90s when you watch it. The film has 4:3 aspect ratio and revolves around skateboarding, teenagers, drugs and many more aspects which attribute to the 90s feeling. This film is clearly very personal to Jonah Hill because of how realistic it looks. I really liked the music choices since it amplified the 90s atmosphere even more. It's blatantly targeted towards people from that time period and I'm sure that group of people will find this movie extremely nostalgic. Hill's script is very enjoyable and quite humourous at times. The characters were really fun to watch and what made them believable were the performances by the actors.

Sunny Suljic did an incredible job especially as a child performer. He had a lot of range in his acting and played the role to the best of his ability. Na-kel Smith, Olan Prenatt, Gio Galicia and Ryder McLaughlin all gave terrific performances especially considering that fact that all of them haven't acted much before this. Even Lucas Hedges did well as I thought he suited the role.

Whilst watching the movie, it reminded me a lot of Larry Clark's KIDS and I'm sure that film was a huge inspiration to Jonah Hill but it kind of made Mid90s lose some of its originality. Also towards the end, the editing became messy. There was a scene that included somewhat of a jumpscare that I didn't like at all.

Mid90s is nowhere near flawless but I respect the amount of work Jonah Hill put into his directorial debut. It's a fun, nostalgic and personal trip coming from someone who's lived through that time and wants to share his love for that period to everyone.