The Kids Are Alright: Cinema's Future Is Here
A look at an early entry for TikTok of the year and a deep dive into Sofia Coppola.
Over the last week, I’ve seen an Oscar-winning documentary on Edward Snowden, a dinosaur sci-fi bonanza starring Adam Driver, an early ‘80s horror-comedy from Sam Raimi and quite a lot of basketball, and yet all of these pale in comparison to a TikTok from Sofia Coppola’s daughter.
Romy Mars is making mincemeat of the competition as she follows in her mother’s footsteps analyzing gender roles, women’s empowerment and entitled youth. Let’s just get to it.
I don’t know if this is peak nepo-baby content or an Andy Kaufman-esque routine, but either way … holy shit, this is good.
The blocking for the camera, the quick cut to her father’s Grammy (Thomas Mars of Phoenix FYI), a stellar character actor in Ari stealing a scene and a quote to cut to the core: “my parents are never home so these are my replacement parents.” There’s just so much tremendous content here. It’s bravura filmmaking at its finest.
The introduction to this whole thing make a vodka sauce pasta with me because I’m grounded because I tried to charter a helicopter from New York to Maryland on my dad’s credit card because I wanted to have dinner with my camp friend is a line that a screenwriter would wait their entire life to write. It’s been echoing in my head ever since I saw the clip.
Now, it makes sense that Romy Mars has this type of scene mastery in her, as her mother is one of my favorite directors. She’s able to translate this feeling of isolation that so many try and fail at, especially when it comes to my two favorite movies of hers, Lost in Translation and Somewhere.
Coppola is a—I’m not sure if this makes any sense—vibe comprehender. Her movies feel so lived-in and compelling despite often being small or specific in scope. One “project” I worked on during the peak-COVID times is that of watching all of her movies I hadn’t seen yet. Naturally. Here’s my latest ranking, because, of course.
Lost in Translation, in particular, is a perfect movie despite its very simple storytelling and raw framework. It’s just two people trying to figure shit out while in Tokyo; the two of them just happen to be an off-kilter-yet-winning duo played by Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson.
Anyway, Romy Mars, Sofia Coppola and the patriarch of the family, Francis Ford Coppola, all have the ability to film an essence previously thought uncapturable. It makes me optimistic for the future of the industry seeing these kids be insane or creating an off-the-wall persona. It’s what moviemaking should always have, and I know you’re also waiting on pins and needles just like me for the actual pasta-making in the teased part two.
Editor’s Note: It’s a very slow time at the movies right now, and after seeing 65, Scream VI and the world’s superhero fatigue, this is what I was able to cook up with mediocre ingredients. Please release a movie soon, Romy. I’m getting too close to seeing a new one from Zach Braff … the horror!