"I Like Movies" - Film Review
I Like Movies is playing to the home crowd. Much like most of the audience in their adolescent years, I Like Movies’ Lawrence (Isaiah Lehtinen) is an awkward teenager who loves movies more than anything else in the world. He has one best friend, Matt (Percy Hynes White), and the two of them watch Saturday Night Live together every weekend, dreaming of life beyond high school. Lawrence lives in a suburb outside Toronto, but he wants to study film at NYU when he graduates, just like all his favorite directors did. In an effort to save money for college, Lawrence gets a job at the local video rental store, where he forms a complicated relationship with his boss (Romina D'Ugo).
Like all the indie coming-of-age greats before it, I Like Movies captures the youthful narcissism, confusion, anger, and joy that come with growing up. In many ways, I Like Movies is Lady Bird’s younger brother. Both have leads who get into quite a few fights with their mothers, ruin their only friendship, and dream of a life in a magical East Coast city that has culture. There’s no nice way to say it: growing up is awful. You’re uncomfortable in your skin, trying to understand the world, and absolutely certain you’ll succeed…until you don’t. Then, somehow, after your entire world has imploded, you have to pick up the pieces and continue on. It’s a tale as old as time, and one that’s told beautifully through the character of Lawrence. He’s abrasive and clueless, but scared and passionate. Surely recognizable to anyone who’s made it through those awkward years.
courtesy of Monument Releasing
Lawrence’s journey really drives home what so many people love about film. For so long, he spent all his time waiting for other people to finish talking so he could speak, because, as all teenagers believe, he’s the most important person in the world. There are plenty of people who say they love film and act in similar ways, raising their voices, believing they’re better than everyone else because of their taste in movies, and refusing to listen to anyone with a different opinion. Film is all about listening. It’s a magical portal to another world that requires the audience to bask in the glow of the screen. To be quiet for an hour-and-a-half (or three-and-a-half) and listen to someone else’s story. It’s an artform that feels boundless, endless, and limitless. At its core, though, is humanity. If we allow them to, movies can tell us about our fellow humans. What other artistic medium is a visceral, living, breathing synthesization of what it’s like to be alive?
Would you be surprised to learn that I Like Movies is an ode to movies? It’s hard not to be jealous of Lawrence’s video store job, even though the relentless push for him to sell DVD copies of Shrek is hard to envy. There’s a beautiful camaraderie among coworkers that comes with the minimum-wage, low-stakes job that’s tangential to the thing you love. He may not be making movies, but Lawrence gets to spend all his time talking about movies, recommending them, renting them, and watching them. I Like Movies also has visual odes to classics like Cinema Paradiso, where Lawrence’s face lights up from the glow of the theater screen and the joy of watching a film.
courtesy of Monument Releasing
I Like Movies also touches on the less-than-glamorous realities of this industry. Since the Me Too movement began, people have been speaking out about the abuse they’ve experienced at the hands of people in power who have created some of the cornerstones of pop culture. Most recently, ’90s kids are learning what the stars of their favorite Nickelodeon TV shows endured in the docuseries Quiet on Set. These are not isolated incidents, and there are still people in positions of power who are actively hurting Hollywood hopefuls. How do we reconcile the truth with the personal connections we have with the films or TV shows where the abuse endured? How do we accept that an abuser is behind our favorite movie? What do we do when the thing we love more than anything else in the world is ruined? How do we continue to love it? I Like Movies doesn’t have the answer to those questions, but it does encourage the audience to examine their own beliefs on the matter.
For those who also believe they need to watch at least one movie a day to survive, I Like Movies will feel like home. It’s the equivalent of visiting that one movie theater from your childhood where you first really fell in love with filmmaking. Simultaneously a love letter and a critique of the artform we all love, I Like Movies is for anyone who’s ever lost themselves in the silver screen.
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