Film - Licorice Pizza

The story of first love is one told hundreds of times every year and usually, the audience sees their sweet side. I did not see that during Licorice Pizza. Gary Valentine is OK, a confident and entrepreneurial child actor but I did not see what he saw in Alana, a few years older. She seemed horrible; young people eh?

I saw no explanation of why the film is called Licorice Piza; I didn’t hear a reference to the title, which apparently refers to vinyl records but no mention of those either. It took a while to settle into an era as we saw adults in 50s twinsets and youngsters in mini skirts before finally, deciding it was the early 1970s.

None of this should matter. However, Licorice Pizza was far from an enjoyable experience for me and no amount of cameos -  even Sean Penn -  could add anything to it. Plus I’m annoyed at the spelling of licorice as my spell check is going crazy. Perhaps this coming of age film is just for the coming of age.

5/10