Overrated little sleeper that is compelling if not totally endearing. There is a good script with wonderful, mostly great performances and it does have a sense of the time, but some of this goes just a beat too far.
The touted dialog and character interactions sometimes go on for just a little too long and loses some of the impact, like the "roast beef sandwich scene" or the "football quiz". There are good swatches at real immature, closeted, misogynistic traits but the timing is awkward and much of it is played out long after it makes the point.
The "record sorting" scene is done with more restraint and has more impact and is more memorable because it plays more like a 45 and not an LP. The flip side is that when this memory lane movie is good it is very good. But it is a mixed bag, just like the albums of its day. One Hit with a lot of filler.
The pacing is smooth but intentional placing of the songs sometimes seems out of place, put the film does put you in a time and place that is fondly remembered as the end of the age of innocence. After all this is 1959 and we know what the 60's have coming. That decade will make one see the previous decade and its problems as whiny blissful ignorance.
The touted dialog and character interactions sometimes go on for just a little too long and loses some of the impact, like the "roast beef sandwich scene" or the "football quiz". There are good swatches at real immature, closeted, misogynistic traits but the timing is awkward and much of it is played out long after it makes the point.
The "record sorting" scene is done with more restraint and has more impact and is more memorable because it plays more like a 45 and not an LP. The flip side is that when this memory lane movie is good it is very good. But it is a mixed bag, just like the albums of its day. One Hit with a lot of filler.
The pacing is smooth but intentional placing of the songs sometimes seems out of place, put the film does put you in a time and place that is fondly remembered as the end of the age of innocence. After all this is 1959 and we know what the 60's have coming. That decade will make one see the previous decade and its problems as whiny blissful ignorance.