Review of The Spectacular Now
That movie is a deep fresh breath. Only few movies have made me feel that way but this one, especially, is pretty efficient. We have the pleasure to see Shailene Woodley and Miles Teller playing a perfect harmonius couple. They also had the chance to play together again in the franchise "Divergent" (in theater 3.21.14).
This movie represents perfectly the period as a teenager ;when we're in high school, that we've got dreams and that the only thing that really matters when we're young is to live at 100% the present. No worries, no problems, just enjoy the time being. But comes a moment when we start wondering about the future. What are we gonna do? With who? Alone? Where? All these questions are present somehow in the movie.
Actually, Sutter, a young man who loves both alcohol and women, is the popular guy by excellence. Everyone knows who he is but him, well, he just doesn't care who the others are...
...Until that day where he ends up in the garden of Aimee, another student of his high-school. Tall, beautiful, natural, funny, brilliant, even herself isn't convinced of having all these qualities. But Sutter proves her she's wrong. They start dating, seeing eachother multiple times. An adventure of laugh, tears, hapiness, fears begins... We can feel how good they're together. That movie is a youth anthem.
But Sutter has a dark side. In plus of the alcohol (a very slight problem), his heart is broken because of his father. The latter abandonned him when he was a boy, leaving him with his mum. After some research, Sutter finds him. But the thing is he won't find back the man he knew or at least the one as he remembered in the past. This new guy is just a lier, a drunk, depraved man, unhealthy...
And it's after this precise moment that OUR heart is broken. We could imagine how important his dad was but not that much. We can observe the revelation moment when Sutter comes back home completely drunk, having threw Aimee away pretending she wasn't in love with him, that she couldn't have fell in love with him (which is totally wrong). He thinks no one loves him, that he's unloved. We're about to cry when he bursts into tears. It's harrowing.
Finally, the movie ends on a positive note which kind of reassure us. It worth paying the price of a cinema seat!