Review: The Spectacular Now

For a few weeks I have chased an opportunity to see The Spectacular Now, and this afternoon I finally got the chance at a small Landmark theater on Houston in NYC (pronounced by New Yorkers HOW-stun).

I skipped watching the trailer and instead judged my interest based on reviews and a movie poster. I am intrigued by any exploration of "now" in regards to living in the present, a theme that to my delight the film most certainly does address. And as someone who feels himself happy to hold onto the uncertainly and growth of an extended adolescence, I revel in an authentic display of youth and the discovery that comes with it.

Strangely enough, the sprinkling of a crowd in the small theater was almost entirely made up of middle-aged couples, who I like to think were there to bask in a special time in their own lives. Or maybe they feel like they never grew up.

Black faded into a computer screen and the voice over of high school senior Sutter (Miles Teller) as he typed a college application essay, a sentence which itself sounds like the action line at the beginning of a bad student film. But while an 18-year-old writing about high school would typically be overdramatic and void of perspective, seasoned writing partners Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber capture the real significance that that time can have.

Now unfolds as a series of simple and understated situations riddled with teen hormones and awkward dialogue—not in that it is written poorly, but in that it is very appropriately crafted to capture the awkward beginnings of high school romance. From Sutter's misguided confidence to Aimee's clean-slate naivety, the characters have the fundamental and true troubles that come from a lack of development. Unlike the pseudo-teenagers depicted in shows like Glee or anything on the CW, Now's characters are a bit more familiar to us; a bit normal, a bit lost, yet guided by the hope of innocence.

I write this as a 21-year-old, myself perhaps lacking the perspective to see what high school really means. But I'll go out on a limb and say that it's not often that a film grasps what it's like to be that young; where life is eating cereal, bickering with parents, and going to French club, with a few spectacular moments sprinkled in.