It wants to be cute, it wants to cool, and it also wants to be thoughtful and engaging, but Sam de Jong is unable to make the story feel tight and focused enough to allow it to succeed on all those levels.
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What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
RogerEbert.com by Brian Tallerico
A strong, creative addition to the crowded coming-of-age genre.
Slant Magazine by Clayton Dillard
It revives hope for a pop-art cinema that's capable of treating characters like actual human beings rather than pawns on a chess board.
The Hollywood Reporter by David Rooney
Even if de Jong's command of the shifting styles is inconsistent, the movie has a quirky spirit that makes it easy to enjoy.
The New York Times by Helen T. Verongos
At times tender and at others unflinchingly brutal, this small drama of innocence and temptation could have aimed much higher.
A slender, morally simplified fable that makes up for its tonal and narrative imprecisions with considerable visual energy, musical pizzazz, and a panoply of colorful characters.
Los Angeles Times by Michael Rechtshaffen
Packing plenty of visual zip and terrific character faces into its compact running time, De Jong never allows the considerable quirkiness to upstage the storytelling.
Austin Chronicle by Steve Davis
The not-so-fresh Prince charts a familiar cautionary tale about the bad choices economically disadvantaged young men sometimes make early in life, but to its credit, it seldom feels hackneyed or cliched.