Licorice Pizza                      5 stars

Over the past decade or so filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson has brought us such memorable and entertaining films as Magnolia, There Will Be Blood and Phantom Thread. This year he has done it again with Licorice Pizza, a comedy romance set in early seventies Encino, California, concerning an on again, off again romance between 15 year old Gary (Cooper Hoffman, son of Philip Seymour Hoffman) and 25 year old Alana (Alana Haim). This may sound as inappropriate and implausible but Anderson makes it work and keeps us rooting for Gary in his quest for romance. It is not only Gary’s pursuit of Alana that keeps our interest, but also the many other exploits and situations this unlikely pair find themselves in. Somehow, 15 year old Gary starts a business selling waterbeds with Alana’s help as well as that of his 15 year old friends and later opens a pinball machine arcade. Gary has a mother who occasionally appears, but he is largely on his own in his various pursuits. He is even a frequent customer of a restaurant visited by Hollywood figures. Young actor Hoffman pulls off the part making you love his character, pimply face and all. Alana, who lives with her Jewish family (with her own real life family playing the part) at first finds Gary’s proposals ridiculous but later is drawn in by his persistence. The film is also noteworthy for the choice of music taken from artists of the sixties and early seventies including The Doors, Gordon Lightfoot, Wings and Blood, Sweat and Tears. There are some special supporting roles that deserve mention, especially Bradley Cooper as a narcissistic movie producer with a bad temper. His performance is worthy of an Academy Award nomination. Sean Penn makes an appearance as what seems to be a porn movie producer and John Michael Higgins is a Japanese restaurant owner who makes some very offensive racially insensitive remarks toward Asian women in some controversial scenes. Apparently the film is loosely based on the life of a friend of Anderson’s giving it an element of truth. Through much of the movie I had the feeling that this is completely ridiculous but it is still funny. Maybe in 1973 things like this could have happened. I have no doubt that Licorice Pizza will be nominated for Best Picture and it very well could win the Oscar.