Review of Palo Alto (2014) by Noah N — 04 Nov 2014

Francis... Sofia... and now Gia on her debut film, 'Palo Alto' (2014); a coming-of-age drama based on a collection of short stories written by James Franco. Franco also stars in the film with Emma Roberts, Nat Wolff, Zoe Levin, Jack Kilmir, and even Val Kilmir.

The film follows the hormonal and confused lives of nicotine-craving teenagers and their daily struggles with their high school lovers, close friends, and family members. Its mature thematic material is told in this poetic bittersweet way, which is really well-executed.

'Palo Alto' (2014) is not a film generally about self-inflicted youths, but a film about teenagers' experiments and discoveries of what it's like to grow up. Even though this is told in a sort of murky understated fashion, the naturally realistic and engaging character interactions certainly clarify the film's messages.

This is something which kind of lacked in 'The Bling Ring' (2013), considering that a majority of the dialogue was just between teenage girls tattling about clothes and pop culture. Not to mention, 'Palo Alto' (2014) is very reminiscent to Sofia Coppola's style of filmmaking: with minimalism tones of loneliness, washout pastel-colored photography, and of course featuring a soundtrack with awesome music.

Whether this is heavily influenced or just Sofia behind the camera the entire time, 'Palo Alto' (2014) fits nicely within the boundaries of coming-of-age, indie rock movies. As a young person, I can really relate to this film even though I have not personally gone through the many situations the characters go through.

It's unique, artsy, and genially complex.