Licorice Pizza - SPOILERS!

Started by wilberfan, November 05, 2021, 08:30:50 PM

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wilberfan

'He's Actually a Great Businessman': On Licorice Pizza's Provocative Age Gap
Philippa Snow
Opinion
26 January 2022     
artreview.com

Paul Thomas Anderson has always had a talent for writing fuck-ups

'There's no line that's crossed,' Paul Thomas Anderson recently told The New York Times, on the subject of the age difference between the leads of his new film, Licorice Pizza (2021), 'and there's nothing but the right intentions. It would surprise me if there was some kind of kerfuffle about it, because there's not that much there [...] There isn't a provocative bone in this film's body.' There has, of course, been a kerfuffle: the movie is about a sort-of romance between a (nominally) 20-something woman and a 15-year-old boy, making Anderson's suggestion that there is nothing provocative about Licorice Pizza somewhat disingenuous. Actually, I think to say that the film is not provocative is to do it a disservice. Do the adult and the child have sex? Certainly not. Do they kiss? Perhaps, depending on how much you take the last ten minutes at face value. Ultimately, whether or not things are consummated does not cancel out the air of obvious and obviously-not-platonic tension that blooms gradually between Gary and Alana, the film's very shagginess and discursiveness letting what exists between them develop slowly and inexorably. On social media, the two loudest factions seem to be those who believe Paul Thomas Anderson has made a dreamy ode to paedophilia and thus should be cancelled, and those who insist that Licorice Pizza is in fact a giddy, feel-good ode to the unlikely friendship that develops between two lost souls. The truth, I think, is somewhere in between: that the film is about romantic-coded love, and that because it is about romantic-coded love between an adult woman and a teenage boy, is a little messed up. Luckily, it is a movie and not an educational film about how to conduct a healthy, fully-functional relationship, making its freakiness an interesting feature, not a bug.

The first meeting between Gary and Alana both upends our expectations, and establishes their unusual dynamic in a few lines: Gary, nerdy-looking but possessed of a frighteningly adult smoothness, is a schoolboy with the patter of a 50-year-old conman; Alana, who at first demurs when she is asked her age and then suggests that she is 25, is a coltish woman who radiates a peculiarly teenage sort of fury and confusion. A photographer's lackey at a company called Tiny Toes, getting her ass slapped by her boss and ultimately going nowhere fast, Alana has arrived at Gary's school for picture day, not so much offering service with a smile as threatening service with a scowl. If the moment the two meet is not exactly what Inherent Vice's (2014) Doc Sportello would call 'cootie food,' it is certainly a moment, and Alana Haim does a fine job of making fictional Alana appear by turns irritated and intrigued by Gary's dinner invitation. It is difficult to explain how elegantly Anderson engineers these characters so that each seems to exist at a similar point on the continuum of maturity without coming across like one of those unsettling guys who has the ages of consent in every country memorised, but their parity is the point – that this funny little latchkey playboy has any luck at all with somebody who claims to be ten years his senior speaks volumes about where Alana happens to be at, professionally and mentally, at the very moment he decides to chance his arm. What drives her is not necessarily attraction, but a longing for his seriousness and decisiveness to transfer to her by osmosis. Gary Valentine, with his Old Hollywood name and his pedigree as a child actor, has done something with his life already at a very early age, and Alana desperately wants 'something' – anything at all – to happen to her, her passivity around the men she meets suggesting that she pictures herself as an inert object that can only be moved by external force.

And yes, it is a little creepy – we are meant to think Alana is not making a sane choice when she meets Gary at the restaurant, so embarrassed and bamboozled by her own decision to be there that she can't look him in the face when she arrives. Male slackers drawn to teenage girls are hardly unusual in the movies, but the inverse is a little less familiar. "He's actually a great businessman," Alana says primly, later, the phrase sounding like an echo of the oft-deployed 'she's actually very mature for her age.' When Anderson depicts her driving an enormous truck down a steep hill in darkness, backwards, her tank empty and her view almost obscured, it's a funny bit of symbolism – going in blind, running on fumes, struggling to keep the enormity of the situation under full control, Alana is barrelling through life and trying not to crash. Licorice Pizza is at once obsessed with inertia and with forward motion, with parked cars and fuel shortages and with endless, reckless sprinting. Of its two leads, it is Gary we feel least concerned for, and it is probably Gary who appears less vulnerable in spite of his being the kid. Every time the (soggy) bottom falls out of another of his enterprises – his career as a child actor, his attempt to make a fortune out of selling waterbeds – it hardly matters, since the point of being a teenager is to make copious mistakes, to fumble, to figure out what we may or may not want. For Alana, stakes are higher: when we see her slump down despondently on the pavement after guiding that careening truck to safety through the darkness, looking on as Gary and his friends make giggling jokes about the phallic nozzle on a petrol can, we are watching her approach rock bottom in real time.

I should say that I am not entirely sure Alana is the age she says she is, as Anderson leaves room for doubt – at one point she says that she is 28, and then corrects herself, and although this was apparently a flubbed line, he still chose to include it in the final film. I'm also not entirely sure that Gary and Alana's sweet reunion in the last scene of the movie actually happens, its suddenness and its dreaminess a hair too close to the ambiguous end of Inherent Vice for me to buy it. Still, to look for loopholes is to some extent to deny Licorice Pizza's genuine strangeness, and to do so is to minimise Alana's genuine strangeness, her quarter-life crisis being the most fascinating aspect of her character. "Do you think it's weird I hang out with Gary and his 15-year-old friends all the time?" she asks her sister at one point, an expression settling momentarily on her face that mirrors the self-flagellating look of shame she wears when she first meets him at the restaurant. "I think it's weird I hang out with Gary and his 15-year-old friends all the time." He may actually be a great businessman, the look says, but he is not technically a man at all, and she is painfully aware of it. Paul Thomas Anderson has always been adroit at writing fuck-ups, and it is a pleasure to see him applying his considerable talent to creating an extremely fucked-up woman – a Janey-come-lately who ends up being the central character of a coming-of-age film despite almost certainly being an actual adult.

HACKANUT


wilberfan


wilberfan

The Funniest Scene in 'Licorice Pizza' Almost Didn't Happen
Harriet Sansom Harris, who plays an unhinged talent agent, had to be convinced to emerge from her pandemic quarantine in the woods.

Harriet Samson Harris plays talent agent Mary Grady. Melinda Sue Gordon/Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures
The funniest scene in Licorice Pizza is shot in a close-up on Harriet Sansom Harris that's so tight, you can almost smell her cigarette. Paul Thomas Anderson's coming-of-age ode to the seventies-era San Fernando Valley revolves around the relationship between 15-year-old actor Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman) and 25-year-old photography assistant Alana Kane (Alana Haim). Haim's scintillating debut performance, Bradley Cooper's and Sean Penn's explosive cameos, and a certain sequence involving a high-speed moving truck meandering backward through the Hollywood Hills at night are rightfully regarded as Licorice Pizza's high points (while its lowest involve two controversial, racist scenes in which John Michael Higgins imitates a Japanese accent).

But it's Harris, born and raised in Fort Worth, who steals the entire film with just one scene. The character actor behind Bebe Glazer on Frasier and Felicia Tilman on Desperate Housewives portrays Mary Grady, Valentine's acting agent. She interviews Alana as a potential client in her standout scene. Anderson based Mary Grady on the real Hollywood child talent agent of the same name, but Harris says she didn't do too much research, as "there wasn't so much to discover."

"I've met a lot of agents," she says. "I wasn't given the whole script, just my part. But it seemed to me like I was here to witness [Alana's] ascendancy. The kid with the career is possibly on the way out. He's brought her into my lair, and I'm going to see if she has any potential."

Harris brings the unhinged Mary to life with a panache that you just can't take your eyes off.  She spends the first part of the discussion listening to Alana's exaggerated array of talents. When she does respond, it's with unpredictable edge and intensity. Harris pivots masterfully throughout her few minutes on the screen, from power and seriousness when discussing Alana's potential career to one line—"No, no, no"—with a new delivery for each syllable.

"She's making fantastically ridiculous [claims] about how she can do all of these things. And I keep sort of giving her home truths," explains Harris. "That made for a really fun dynamic in the scene. It was just so much fun. Cooper and Alana were so available and adorable. We were all on a mission to try and have fun."

Harris has received praise for her performance on social media and in reviews, so it's especially exhilarating when she tells me that she almost turned the role down. With the COVID-19 pandemic decimating the film, theater, and television industries, Harris decided to bunker down in the Massachusetts woods with her partner, Matt Sullivan.

Then, in the summer of 2020, she received a text message from her agent saying Anderson had written a part in Licorice Pizza that he thought she'd be perfect for. "I just thought, 'Oh my God. I'm living in the middle of the woods. I haven't even seen a person in weeks.' It just seemed highly unlikely."

But because of her past working relationship with Anderson, Harris couldn't resist giving the scene a read. Back in 1998, she had read for a small role in Magnolia, which she recalls as simply a "really fun day." She wasn't cast, but Harris clearly left an impression.

Nearly twenty years later, when Anderson was making 2017's Phantom Thread, he cast Harris as drunken heiress Barbara Rose. "I loved the part so much," says Harris, who only appears in four scenes in the film. "Paul just makes you feel alive on set. Like you're a necessary ingredient. He is such a great writer. He gives you the essential stuff. The writing tells you what he wants."

Ultimately, it was Anderson's writing, and the appeal of collaborating with him as a director again, that convinced Harris to fly to California during a pandemic and spend just one day on set shooting her scene as Mary.

"They were very sweet and gave me some time to think about it. I just thought, 'Well, if this is the last job I have, if this is going to be it—because who knows what's gonna happen with [COVID]—I really want it to be with him.' "

Drenk

His courageous genes make him punch all the cowardly genes in his vicinity. Bless his soul.

https://twitter.com/variety/status/1487151384801599492

Maybe he could have played Sean Penn in Licorice Pizza if it were not set in the 70s. But I forget, that was the only time and place where sexism and racism existed...! We're living in an Enlightened and Unsexy world.
Ascension.

max from fearless


'Well, if this is the last job I have, if this is going to be it—because who knows what's gonna happen with [COVID]—I really want it to be with him.' "

You feel this in her performance. The close up of her is INCREDIBLE. Her pauses are stellar. Whilst I have issues with this film as a whole, the filmmaking and some of the performances (INCLUDING HERS AND ALANAS) are some of the best I've seen in years. I pray Harriet and Paul get to work together again, third times the charm and perhaps a bigger role!?!

Thanks again for the share Wilberfan!

max from fearless


Just wanna say - the longshot that Alana and Gary walk into Harriet's office is sublime, the light coming through the window is amazing. Cut to the CU of Harriet and then the over the shoulder shot of both Alana and Barry that feels like the lens has been changed to somewhat flatten the image, and ends up feeling super 70s. Just studying the work on this film is crazy. This scene is so well constructed. Paul and his team really took it to another level with this movie.

I'm thinking that is my fav cinematography of his since The Master and TWBB, although I'm still somewhat bitter that I saw Master in 70mm 4 times, only to get the blu ray and have it look a trillion times better - as if my projectionist didn't give a damn, despite the ticket prices and the way it was sold....Whereas my screenings of LP have looked INCREDIBLE (wish mofos weren't coughing through the film but thats another story....) Do these guys have a shot at best cinematography?

Drenk

The Master 70mm in Odeon West End, right? It looked very underwhelming. But I saw it twice in 70mm in Paris and it wasn't that much better. The Blu-Ray is truly impressing, though.
Ascension.

max from fearless

Quote from: Drenk on January 31, 2022, 02:10:23 PM
The Master 70mm in Odeon West End, right? It looked very underwhelming. But I saw it twice in 70mm in Paris and it wasn't that much better. The Blu-Ray is truly impressing, though.

Thats the one! And thats exactly it, very underwhelming! I remember popping in the blu ray and my jaw dropped, the ways the colours popped! The red of Dodd's dressing grown. It's such a shame he didn't check in on the prints/projection in Europe with the Master, because the colours, production design and costumes are incredible and really got let down by those Odeon West End screenings...

But I think the freewheeling naturalism of LP mixed with more formal elements just make it more and more astounding from a cinematography perspective. The silhouette shot of Alana talking to the guy from the Wach's office, and the yellow wall behind? Wow!!! Production Design should also get a nod.

HACKANUT


max from fearless

Quote from: HACKANUT on January 31, 2022, 11:47:39 PM
Quote from: max from fearless on January 31, 2022, 01:29:24 PM

...Alana and Barry...

this is very food :yabbse-grin:

Oh my God! I'm slipping but it's also very telling about some of my deeper thoughts on LP....
But no, honestly that's maybe the best comeback I've read on this site!  :bravo:

HACKANUT

Quote from: max from fearless on February 01, 2022, 09:51:02 AM
Quote from: HACKANUT on January 31, 2022, 11:47:39 PM
Quote from: max from fearless on January 31, 2022, 01:29:24 PM

...Alana and Barry...

this is very food :yabbse-grin:

Oh my God! I'm slipping but it's also very telling about some of my deeper thoughts on LP....
But no, honestly that's maybe the best comeback I've read on this site!  :bravo:

haha, the Freudian slip of it all was too perfect  :yabbse-grin:

and it sounds like we're on the same wavelength with the PDL comparisons.

also, couldnt agree more about the Harriet scene. that shot when they're walking into her office is gratuitously beautiful. straight up some of the best cinematography of his career is in this movie.

Lots of Bees

Totally agree. Yeah it's not as showy as The Master (weird to call The Master "showy" but the cinematography is in a way) but it's so beautiful and there's something so specific about it... NO other movies look like this. The way light looks coming through windows, the way over the shoulders are framed (no directors frame and light over-the-shoulder and around-the-hip and between-two-character shots the way he does), the constant frames within frames and shots into mirrors and smoke, the subtly moving camera, the unique bokeh, the COLORS, the rotating light outside the pinball arcade... I guess it's a given at this point that it's not gonna get recognized by any awards groups for cinematography but it'd be nice to see it get a nom or something. It's not cinematography that is stand-out incredible on first glance but for my tastes it's about as good as it gets.

EDIT: And this is coming from someone who wasn't really sold on the way it looked from the trailer. I thought it looked great but kind of disappointing when each of his last 5 films did something so bold and obviously beautiful with the visuals. I think I wanted something that looked more like Inherent Vice, and this isn't exactly that. But after seeing it I'm a convert, it combines all of his best visual signatures in my opinion. I'm sure the 70mm had a lot to do with that to be fair but I have a good feeling it'll transfer well no matter where you watch it.

Drill


Rooty Poots

Quote from: Drill on February 03, 2022, 01:56:45 PM
Spoiler: ShowHide


This was terrific and makes me miss PTA's audio commentaries even more. How great would it be if he returned to doing them with this release?
Hire me for your design projects ya turkeys! Lesterco