I have to admit that this film snuck up on me a bit. I decide to give it a chance based on the glowing rotten tomatoes ranking (and the fact that I have the soul of a 16 year old girl when it comes to coming-of-age movies. The film began innocently enough - a girl tries to navigate the difficulties of dating as a teen. I saw the familiar trappings - awkward teen, dialog that has never happened in any high school ever, kids dressing like nobody has ever dressed in high school... you get the drift.

Anyway, I was beginning to suspect that this film might have been another case of a lot of people saying that a movie was just "ok" and thus a good RT score. And then something happened.... the film got good. I don't know exactly when it happened but I suspect it wasn't long after the deal was made. All of the sudden the dialog became intelligent (it no longer felt like a "coming-of-age" film and I was focused on the developing story. Don't get me wrong - the two leads are what really make this movie hum. I didn't expect to like this film as much as I did but I really enjoyed it. Side note - I also love both the direct mentions of 80's films (16 Candles) as well as the indirect mentions (Heathers, others). This film fit nicely into the upper-end of this genre.

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See other good coming-of-age movies I've reviewed here: https://ihatebadmovies.com/movie-reviews/?tx_post_tag=coming-of-age&_orderby=wp_review_total%2Cdesc