The Exploding Girl (2010)

Don't listen to the negative reviews

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

I won't say that Exploding Girl was more accessible down here in Brazil than it was in its home country, but I had the distinct advantage of watching it not merely as entertainment or a time-killer but as news from frontlines at which new technologies cross with an evolving emotional tone and evolving mores and the technology gives the emotional tone and the mores impetus.(1) As one of the last people in the world not to use a cell phone, I was pleased to see evidence to support my lingering suspicion that most cell phone communication is merely to "check in" — I think that was the language of the movie itself — and to provide reassurance that the caller will call again later, again to check in, again to provide reassurance of yet another call to check in later still and so on, I assume, ad infinitum unto death.2) But that's not really the whole of it. The constant cell phoning back and forth seems also to be necessary for purposes of temperature taking. First, there's the toneless "How are you?" and then an affectless, seemingly obligatory "I'm okay, how are you?" and then a further affectless "I'm okay" at the other end. Then it's allowed that the call has been just to check in and there will be another call just to check in later. But maybe it's not just the checking-in that's important but the taking of emotional temperature and the reassurance that everything is on an even keel, that no one's lurching too far out of the "okay" range, no one's getting either too hot and bothered or too chilly or cold and thereby threatening to tumble off into catatonia. And, if this is the case, then the constant checking in and temperature taking helps to hold people in the "okay" range. What do you think? Do I have this anything like right?(3) How mannerly these young people are, within of course the parameters of their evolving manners! How solicitous they are of each other! How caring! Greg has taken up with an old girlfriend during a summer away from his current girlfriend. He calls the current girlfriend up to break it to her. He does it unshirkingly, with no more trepidation or embarrassment than if he were calling to tell her he's held up in traffic and he's going to be ten minutes late to dinner. And then he calls again later to make sure she's okay. And she has of course told him in response to the initial announcement of his calling it quits that everything is okay, everything is fine, and now everything is still fine. Reminds me of something John Updike had Rabbit observe in one of the Rabbit novels, probably Rabbit Is Rich, namely, that these young people are operating at a lower sexual temperature than his generation operated at. And then there is, in this movie, the lifelong friend Al, who wonders aloud to Ivy if their relationship might not possibly develop beyond the palsiness that has so far been its outer limit and, when she doesn't immediately fall into his arms, he apologizes for possibly rocking the boat, threatening the equilibrium of things. Friendship and . . . something more than friendship — if this movie is to be believed, and in this respect it seems credible enough, the boundaries I speak of are blurring to the vanishing point. But, then, you guys up there in the U.S. already know all this stuff about the way relationships are evolving. You're not learning anything new from this movie. I am learning from it, I am learning a lot from it, and that's why I hold the movie dear.

This little independent drama written and directed by Bradley Rust Gray definitely has a niche audience. Made on a shoestring budget and filmed "guerilla style" on location in New York City. It seems to be a throwback to the 1970s when these kinds of movies were made more frequently by people like by John Cassavetes, Bob Rafelson, and others Zoe Kazan plays Ivy, a basic girl next door type who is home for spring break. Al (Mark Rendall), a childhood friend, asks to stay with her and her mom as he has nowhere else to go. Their relationship is like any other boy-girl "friends" situation. It can be awkward and strange at times, and there are moments when you think there could be something more going on. This is pretty much the entire story in a nutshell. Zoe is above all "real and honest" in her portrayal of Ivy, who also suffers from epilepsy. She has a boyfriend back at school (Greg), but when he is involved in car accident with an old girlfriend as a passenger, their relationship is the next victim. This is one of "those" movies that are heavy on feeling and atmosphere. Its structure is plot less and meandering, but you really can't seem to pull your eyes away from the screen as these characters really start to grow on you. There is no music or score to the film and many of the scenes are filmed at a distance, letting the characters interact with there real environments. The authentic feel of this film really puts it at a different level than most films. Nothing feels forced or made up to serve a greater good, things happen and the characters react. The people at Oscilloscope have put out a DVD package that is available, but I would first recommend seeing it on Netflix watch instantly.Like I said at the beginning this movie is really aimed at a very specific audience but if you're ready to disconnect from a summer full of CGI Robots, Aliens, and big budget garbage, give the Exploding Girl a try and thank me in the morning.

Zoe Kazan's performance in The Exploding Girl was nuanced and heartfelt, but unfortunately diluted by her extensive screen time. The film spent ENTIRELY too much time lingering on Ivy staring contemplatively into the distance (an indulgence that plagues many indie films). For me, this was the only major flaw, and I felt that the movie overcame it. The cinematography was otherwise really beautiful, looking at the world in ways we don't usually think to look at it. The characters were real people, if not fully developed. They provided an honest look into the lives of modern young adults, whose relationships are sustained but also often trivialized by technology, like Ivy's ever-present cell phone.This film is subtle, sincere and complex, and I'd recommend it if you're willing to sit through slow-moving scenes and lengthy shots of self-consciously thoughtful Ivy. If nothing else, the last minute of the film is a miraculous moment that absolves all its prior sins.

I don't like "movies" shot on video, and this one is no exception. Its semi-improvised dialog was also a barrier to appreciation, as well as the fledgling director's pretentious approach to photography.Except for interiors, nearly all the barely-edited shots are long shots using very shallow focus - a technique I thought went out in the '60s. The cast's conversations are shot as if using a hidden camera (the hi-def RED camera is used here), from across the street with intervening cars or pedestrians frequently blocking the principals from our view. Add to that protagonist Mark Rendall's speech impediment (I counted him stating the word "like" 25 times in less than a minute) and you have distancing of the viewer taken to the extreme.Our heroine played OK enough by Zoe Kazan (she won a dubious Best Actress award from the lowliest of film festivals, the must-miss Tribeca event, which doesn't even take place in Tribeca anymore) remains a blank. She's an epileptic and sure enough, has too many beers, causing a seizure late in the film, but I didn't find that potential disability handled with any insight or relevance to the surrounding film. The story's emphasis on her also was a drag; it reminded me of that Golden Age of porno (now several decades back) when one sometimes experienced a horrific moment, usually during the second or third reel, of realization: "We're going to be stuck looking at this solitary girl for the whole movie!".Mercifully short, about 75 minutes after removing the slow-slow padding of the end credits, the feature had only two good scenes: one rooftop checking out the pet pigeons that starts as a too-obvious homage to Zoe's grandpa Elia Kazan (classic Saint/Brando scene from ON THE WATERFRONT) and ends up improbably as a Werner Herzog homage, capturing the strange abstract patterns created by flocks of birds in formation that was the signature image of Werner's 2004 film THE WHITE DIAMOND. The other scene I enjoyed was a simple finale ring shot of the hero & heroine asleep in the backseat of a car, unconsciously clasping their hands together.Low points were a "gee whiz" visit to a SoHo building supposedly once the site of Nikola Tesla's shop -like so many Manhattan non-landmarks it looks like nothing now; and the endless use of cell phones, one of which permitted an entire performance (Zoe's heel of a boyfriend Greg) to be literally phoned in. I am also nominating THE EXPLODING GIRL as the feature film with the lowest costume budget in recent history: it looks like they spent about $3.95 for the heroine's and hero's rumpled, slept-in crappy outfits; ditto ALL the extras (who obviously wore theirs from home).