'Licorice Pizza' is a deceptively sweet coming of age movie/love story. Set in 1973 Encino, California the film is Paul Thomas Anderson's tribute to the world of his earliest memories, in that sense a kind of rough equivalent to Quinton Tarantino's 'One Upon a Time in Hollywood'.
The moment Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman, the son of the late Philip Seymour Hoffman, a frequent collaborator of Anderson's) sees Alana Kaye (indie singer Alana Haim) he is smitten, and despite her being 25 and he only 15 he will contrive anyway imaginable for the two spend time together, from chaperoning to joint business ventures.
Gary is a child actor starting to age out of peak castability, as with many characters in Paul Thomas Anderson's work he is a natural born hustler, always looking for money making opportunities, here ranging from water beds to pinball machines.
His background in film allows for brushing against fictionalized version of real celebrates of the time, including a Lucile Ball type (Christine Ebersole) and Bradly Cooper as Jon Peters, a real life hair dresser, film producer, and famed lady's man whose been married to both Leslie Ann Warren and Pamela Anderson, as well as a decade long relationship with Barbara Streisand. I particularly enjoyed Tom Waits as a Sam Peckinpah type director and Sean Penn as a William Holden type star, I wouldn't of thought Penn could be made to look so much like Holden.
The film buts against the 1970's more generally, everything from the arb oil embargo to closeted gay politicians, but the relationship between Gary and Alana is that timeless, awkward yearning kind, and Hoffman and Haim are wonderful, fully capable of anchoring the film in what is each of their screen debuts.
Episodic in structure but thoroughly charming, very evocative of its time and place and of course boasting a wonderful period sound track. One of the best films of the year. ****
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