Licorice Pizza (2021)

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It's picture day at Something Something High School in the San Fernando Valley of the early '70s. 15-year old Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman, son of Philip Seymour), child actor and overly-confident schemer spots the photographer's quirky, alluring 25-year old assistant Alana Kane (Alana Haim) and insists himself upon her, imploring her to meet him later at his favorite restaurant, where he's a bit of a celebrity and is surely looking forward to acting like one in front of her. She says maybe, but no.

She does show up, and immediately cautions him not to be creepy. He just stares at her, for too long. She can hear him breathing. We, the audience, can hear him breathing. "Stop that." "Stop breathing?"

What follows is just one continual adventure as these two do their best to find their ways in the jungles of Los Angeles. Never too far apart, but never too close, they orbit each other -- an orbit that seems destined to degrade and pull them together, but LA is a tough town when you still have no idea who you are or what you're going to be.

Series of mini- and mis-adventures are sewn together in a tapestry that you're never quite sure where it's going or what's going to happen next, which is a good thing. Maybe Sean Penn or Bradley Cooper will enter the picture with a glorious bit of scenery-chewing and surrealism, and then drift away just as quickly. Maybe Gary's latest scheme will work. Maybe Alana will figure out what the hell she's doing. Maybe they'll finally find each other is all they need. Or maybe the age and personality difference is just too much. You like them, you're rooting for them, but you're never quite sure what it is you're rooting for.

It has neither the emotional impact or visceral grandiosity of many other Paul Thomas Anderson movies, but it is no less enthralling, exciting, unnerving, and wonderful.

Cooper Hoffman is so good you'll almost forget about his dad.

FOUR (****) STARS.

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FUN FACT: In PTA's Punch-Drunk Love, Philip Seymour Hoffman plays a mattress salesman, and in Licorice Pizza, Cooper takes a shot at selling waterbeds.

Certainly not a coincidence. This, please, cannot be that.

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Apparently there is "controversy" about the movie now.

To be clear: These are all fake controversies stirred up by Twitter trolls and "woke" idiots who never saw the movie but got excited there was something they could pretend to be upset about.

I will address them both here, to make sure you all know how fake and dumb all this shit is:

CONTROVERSY #1: RACISM AGAINST ASIANS!!!!!

There are two scenes in the movie, totaling about 3 minutes of screen time, where an old white guy is sitting there with his Japanese wife of the day, and he doesn't speak Japanese, so when he talks to her, he just speaks English in a ridiculous Japanese accent. At worst it's just a dumb gag that isn't terribly hilarious. If anything, it was making fun of dumb old racist white guys in the 70s. He is the butt of the joke, not the wives, who are sitting there obviously thinking, Jesus Christ what a moron.

This is not a controversy. There is no way anyone calling for this boycott saw the movie: https://ew.com/awards/media-action-netw ... ice-pizza/

CONTROVERSY #2: PEDOPHELIA!!!!!

The overarching story of the movie is a relationship between a 15-year-old boy (Cooper Hoffman) and a 25-year old girl (Alana Haim). It's never overtly romantic, no matter how much the horndog Hoffman wants it to be from the start. You never quite know how this relationship is going to work out, or what it even is. But it made people UNCOMFORTABLE!!! Oh dear! Why isn't all art presented in a tidy, clean way that adhered to all modern societal norms!

This is not a controversy. This is stupid.

This is all the dumbest thing of the year.

[AArdvark]

I believe this is the dumbest thing of the year...

https://americanmilitarynews.com/2021/1 ... ells-song/

[Flack]

There may be no teenage heartache more painful and universal than falling in love with the right person at the wrong time. I've been in both of their shoes -- I'm sure many of us have -- and when conflict arose between Gary (who wants to open a pinball hall) and Alana (who needs more meaning in her life), the most heartbreaking thing is that neither one of them is wrong.

4 stars.

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How neither of them nabbed a best actor nomination is -- well, it's very understandable, neither one of them are actors. If one of them was named Meryl Streep and had done one tenth as good a job, they'd be a 500,000-STAR LOCK.

That's the Hollywood Elite for ya.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

What do you mean they aren't actors?

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Neither of them has any other acting credits*, and may never have any others. They were just people PTA knew and said hey you wanna be in my movie?

* Alana Haim has some on IMDB but just for being in music videos for her band, "Haim".

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Hoffman's kid should be an actor, right? Acting was like his father's favorite thing. Hmm? Right, second-favorite thing.

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EEheehehehe.

That's the thing, he's almost as good as his dad in this movie, if not occasionally better, which leads me to one of two conclusions:

1. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, and it would be a shame if this really was the only acting he ever does.
2. Acting is really, really easy.

I'm on Team #2, myself.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

How do they pronounce licorice in this?

Lik-o-RISH or Lik-o-wiss? The last one is correct.

[Flack]

I will say in the movie's defense that it is pronounced the same way every time.

[AArdvark]

Lick-rish