Licorice Pizza

Licorice Pizza has a secret. It’s always there, like a ghost lurking in the shadows and in the periphery. It informs every second and every frame of the movie. And every once in a while, PT Anderson et al show you the secret for a NANOSECOND, and then happily and skillfully steer you away to another episode of frivolity, during which the main kids, muy autentica, try as hard as they can NOT to fall in love. It’s a real struggle! And on 70mm film, it’s beautiful. It’s a sugary-sweet time-capsule about a magical world where age and maturity and “dateable readiness” is fluid. It’s almost impossible to view this from a modern-day, “me too” lens, and I don’t recommend you do, because it might be a little problematic. The movie tries to trick you into putting away your modern-day sensibilities and bask in the warm glow of a magic hour in the summer of 1974, when pinball machines became legal again and when the girls and the guys fell in love. It works, if you try not to think about that secret.