Licorice Pizza 2021

I’ve been excited for this film for a while and I got the chance to see it at the oldest cinema in the country in 35mm. It was a fun experience and a decent film. The second PTA film I’ve seen, punch drunk love is one of my favourite films so I really need to see more.  This film felt kind of perfect for me, it looked amazing and it was a very character driven story about an interesting romance, kinda felt like a slice of life and it was done by someone I already knew to be a brilliant director. I also like the cast, the waitress ( she isn’t a waitress in the film that’s just her real name), Bradley Cooper and Sean Penn. Stylistically it felt similar to another one of my favourite films, Almost Famous. Really liked the soundtrack too. This film really should have amazed me and that’s why I was so excited for it as just watching the trailer in the cinema made me really happy. But it didn’t amaze me, don’t get me wrong it’s a good film, it just wasn’t as good as I expected it to be. The story was good and the characters were interesting, I just didn’t like them. This isn’t a big critique on the film as they were good characters, but in such a character driven film, the characters have to be likeable, and maybe it’s just my personal opinion and maybe no one else will feel like same way but I just found them kind of annoying. I feel like if the leads were more likeable and maybe it focused more on the kids acting rather than making him become a business man and really zig zagging with the plot of this film, I would have absolutely loved it, but I didn’t. It was still a good film and I’d recommend it, but it just wasn’t what I expected and I feel a little let down.  Felt a lot like once upon a time in Hollywood, nothing really happened, not in the same way, stuff happens, but the way the story was structured felt kind of … unique. Once upon a time in Hollywood was much better on a rewatch though so maybe I shouldn’t give this a go. It had a lot of good moments, an ok ending I guess, it just didn’t grip me in the way I expected and there were a lot of times were I felt like I was just waiting for the film to end. I don’t entirely know why, but I think I explained it to the best of my ability. It was the kind of film that should have amazed me, but it didn’t, I had high expectations and it didn’t meet them at all. But it was alright, a memorable experience because of the cinema not because of the film.  7.8/10