Miss Flicks

Licorice Pizza: Film Review

Paul Thomas Anderson’s films are hit and miss with me. But coming off the back of the terrific Phantom Thread and with all the rave reviews, I felt confident about Licorice Pizza.

This coming-of-age comedy is set in the San Fernando Valley in California in 1973. It follows the lives of the 15-year-old actor and businessman Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman) and 25-year-old photographer’s assistant Alana Kane (Alana Haim) after they meet at a school photoshoot and he asks her out on a date. Alana resists his charms given the 10-year age difference, but they become close friends and business partners. What follows is essentially a “will they or won’t they” story.

I have seen so many raves for this film but I’m not as enamoured with it as everyone else. I liked it, for sure, but I didn’t love it. I was into the look and feel of it and the two central performances but I thought the story was too long and sprawling and could have been more focused on the romance plot. It occasionally spends too much time going off on tangents before getting back to what I cared about and there are a few characters that are ultimately superfluous to the story, even if they are quite funny diversions.

There has been a lot of controversy on social media about the story, given that Gary is only 15. I understand where people are coming from but I didn’t see it in a scandalous way at all. Alana is very resistant to them becoming more than friends precisely for that reason! I personally rooted for their central relationship and hoped that they would ultimately end up together.

And as much as the film is about their friendship, it is also very focused on Alana trying to figure out who she is and what she wants to do with her life. She lacks a sense of direction and wants to find her purpose so she tries out a few very different jobs and goes on dates with different guys, trying to find her way in the world.

Haim, who is best known as a singer in the sibling band Haim, makes her movie debut here and she is terrific. She has such a naturalistic and understated acting style; it doesn’t feel like she’s playing a character at all. Anderson is close friends with the Haim family and I love that they’re all in it – Danielle and Este Haim play Alana’s sisters and their parents play the parents!

Hoffman, the son of Philip Seymour Hoffman, is utterly charming in his debut movie role. Gary is a hustler with the gift of the gab and seems to get on with everyone. It was also refreshing to see the leads of a romance story looking so normal and natural, with no (or almost no) make-up.

Bradley Cooper was amusing as the angry film producer Jon Peters, Sean Penn puts in a memorable appearance as actor Jack Holden, and I liked Benny Safdie as mayoral candidate Joel Wachs. I disliked John Michael Higgins’ role and the way he mocks the Japanese accent made me cringe so much. Those scenes should have been cut.

Licorice Pizza is a charming movie with two terrific leads. I may not be as effusive as others but I enjoyed it a lot.

In cinemas now