Licorice Pizza

The conceit behind the romance at the center of “Licorice Pizza” represents a LOT for the audience to have to accept. A generous interpretation of it, and the film as a whole, is as analogous with the messy and rapidly changing times evoked with the setting as well as representing the uncertainties of exiting adolescence, but it’s still a LOT to accept. If you can (and that’s a big IF), there’s a lot to like here, from the winning performances from the debuting leads (especially Alana Haim) to one of my favorite comic sequences in film in the past year.

7