Young AdultJust like a record can skip or a car can spin its wheels, some people just get stuck in one place, and can't move forward. Young Adult is the story of Mavis Gary (Charlize Theron), an "author" (read: ghost writer) of a teen fiction serial, who lives in an emotional state of arrested development, harboring resentment and delusions about her life based on her own glamorized interpretation of her high school past as the coolest girl at Mercury High...almost twenty years ago. When she finds out her former beau, Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson), has just become a father, she embarks on a quest to vicariously reclaim her past by shamelessly trying to steal him back.
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While credited as both a comedy and drama, Young Adult is best described as a character study of Mavis, who--while she is unlikable--is a surprisingly complex character. Mavis professes that the best years in her life were when she was with Buddy, because to her, these where the years when she was exclusively the center of attention. Mavis spends copious amount of time at beauty salons, primping and preening to retain that youthful look from her past. When Mavis begins pursuing Buddy, she constantly meets him in high fashion, perfectly accessorized, as though she walked out of a magazine. This has the unintended effect of making her resemble a kind of living doll, coming across as too perfect to be believable. Mavis tries to seduce through body language as much as her wardrobe and makeup, although the way she flirts is more like a slutty high school girl than a genuine temptress. Buddy tells her that she looks like she did when they were in high school; he means this as a compliment, but it also represents that she has stifled her emotional growth as well. But this sexy facade is not the real Mavis; the "real" Mavis is who we see at the start of Young Adult--a woman who frequently wakes up face down in her own clothes, hung over, grasping to suck down a swig of diet cola, exhausted from the moment she opens her eyes. The real Mavis is more convincing and more natural, from her morning exercise routine to Wii Fit, to the Victoria's Secret bag she leaves in the cluttered back seat of her Mini Cooper. Mavis completes the elitist princess persona made famous by heiress Paris Hilton by stowing her Pomeranian (obnoxiously named "Dolce") away in her purse while trying to sneak him past an indifferent motel clerk. These moments are awkwardly funny because they represent how out of balance Mavis' life really is. Mavis pursues a version of nostalgic happiness she once enjoyed and prided herself on having, but deep down she recognizes that it is futile. She dates men she doesn't seem to like, with whom she doesn't have anything in common, and yet finds herself waking up with them after a meaningless one-night stand. She lacks genuine self-confidence; although she is recognized as a local celebrity by her erstwhile acquaintances in Mercury, Minnesota as a writer, she creates another fiction by telling people that she's returned to her hometown for some "real estate thing". In lieu of inner monologue, Mavis narrates her writing for the last entry in her saccharine series--with her lead character, Kendall, being essentially a cipher for her. Mavis even reimagines her own past into a perfect little microcosm of self-indulgent fantasy, unabashedly plagiarizing lines of dialogue that she eavesdropped from conversations between other teenagers.
What helps make Mavis' journey to the hometown she claims to despise more bearable comes from her unexpected reunion with former classmate, Matt Freehauf (Patton Oswalt). Matt is a nerdy guy who was violently assaulted and crippled in high school following a hideous attack by jocks who thought he was gay. Matt and Mavis' reunion comes out of serendipity; he happens to be sitting next to her at the old watering hole back home in Mercury. Mavis doesn't recognize him at first, however, and he has to remind her that his locker used to be next to hers in high school. Mavis confesses her scheme to Matt in a drunken state, and he tries to dissuade her from becoming a homewrecker. He becomes the proverbial angel on Mavis' shoulder, a conscience which--just like when they were in school--she opts to ignore, but she still finds herself drawn to his company, perhaps in part because of a garage distillery he maintains and shares with her. It becomes evident that Mavis and Matt have some things in common--in fact, more than Mavis really has in common with Buddy. Aside from their interests in alcohol, they both have a form of high school trauma which has kept them both in a kind of stunted state; for Matt, it is the deformity to his legs and genitalia that came from the beating, but for Mavis, the damage is internal. It's intimated that Mavis is trying to reach out for help throughout Young Adult, even if she doesn't really know how to do so. She is conscious of her drinking problem; when her mother (Jill Eikenberry) finds she has returned to Mercury, and takes her to their house for a home-cooked meal, Mavis says that she thinks she is an alcoholic, although her parents slough it off as yet another one of their daughter's cries for attention. Mavis envies the sense of fulfillment she sees in the lives of her former classmates, and she is unaccustomed to not being the one who is at the center of everyone else's universe, which in turn provokes her to try to upstage others by appearing perfect at all times. The pressure finally proves to be too much during an incident at the baby naming event for the daughter of Buddy and his wife, Beth (Elizabeth Reaser); and when her silk blouse becomes stained with juice, the already disintegrating veneer of civility is utterly destroyed, revealing Mavis to be the callow, selfish fraud she is. In an earlier scene, when Mavis meets Beth, she discovers that Beth teaches emotionally stunted children how to express themselves with a poster indicating emotions. Mavis comments that there is no "neutral" expression, and Beth replies that it is unnecessary, because these children are struggling with showing how they actually feel. This is an ironic observation given Mavis' own difficulty with expressing herself honestly.
Mavis' return to Mercury is an opportunity for her to rediscover herself by looking at the mirror of her past. In this, Young Adult is similar to the black comedy, Grosse Pointe Blank--the films also share some overlap in their soundtracks. The musical selections in Young Adult are especially key, including The Lemonheads' "It's a Shame About Ray" while Matt describes how he became known as the one-time "hate crime guy". Even the opening title montage--featuring "The Concept" by Teenage Fanclub-- depicts Mavis singing in her car while driving to Mercury, coyly and irritatingly rewinding over and over to play the song again and again, itself a representation of how stuck Mavis is on her glorified past. Mavis' fixation on her memories of those good old days from high school is so intense, that when she dresses to meet Buddy at a bar--where Beth is performing--her appearance is reminiscent of the end of Grease, where Olivia Newton-John famously emerges with teased hair and a tight-fitting black outfit, and subsequently secures the affections of her man. (It's fair to say, however, that Mavis shares more in common with Rizzo than Sandy.) When the epiphany comes for Mavis at the end of her "heroine's journey", there is an intentional subversion of this, making her adventure more like a fable--a resolution more reminiscent of A Clockwork Orange. And it wouldn't take much squinting to see in Mavis in her rediscovered "scrunchie" as a surviving member of the ill-fated clique of cool girls from Heathers. What makes Mavis such a tragic figure is that as caustic and superficial as she is, she is also actively demeaning and degrading herself by living as an "idea" of herself as she would like to be, not how she truly is--a form of emotional unbalance sometimes associated with eating disorders like anorexia. It is a strange kind of revenge that awaits the snippy "psychotic prom queen", a slow burn that eats away the soul.
Recommended for: Fans of a surprisingly complex character study about a thoroughly unlikable character, challenging the audience to empathize with Mavis and her warped world view. Though marketed as a comedy, Young Adult is better viewed from the perspective of a cautionary tale, warning about falling into the quagmire of self-indulgent nostalgia.
What helps make Mavis' journey to the hometown she claims to despise more bearable comes from her unexpected reunion with former classmate, Matt Freehauf (Patton Oswalt). Matt is a nerdy guy who was violently assaulted and crippled in high school following a hideous attack by jocks who thought he was gay. Matt and Mavis' reunion comes out of serendipity; he happens to be sitting next to her at the old watering hole back home in Mercury. Mavis doesn't recognize him at first, however, and he has to remind her that his locker used to be next to hers in high school. Mavis confesses her scheme to Matt in a drunken state, and he tries to dissuade her from becoming a homewrecker. He becomes the proverbial angel on Mavis' shoulder, a conscience which--just like when they were in school--she opts to ignore, but she still finds herself drawn to his company, perhaps in part because of a garage distillery he maintains and shares with her. It becomes evident that Mavis and Matt have some things in common--in fact, more than Mavis really has in common with Buddy. Aside from their interests in alcohol, they both have a form of high school trauma which has kept them both in a kind of stunted state; for Matt, it is the deformity to his legs and genitalia that came from the beating, but for Mavis, the damage is internal. It's intimated that Mavis is trying to reach out for help throughout Young Adult, even if she doesn't really know how to do so. She is conscious of her drinking problem; when her mother (Jill Eikenberry) finds she has returned to Mercury, and takes her to their house for a home-cooked meal, Mavis says that she thinks she is an alcoholic, although her parents slough it off as yet another one of their daughter's cries for attention. Mavis envies the sense of fulfillment she sees in the lives of her former classmates, and she is unaccustomed to not being the one who is at the center of everyone else's universe, which in turn provokes her to try to upstage others by appearing perfect at all times. The pressure finally proves to be too much during an incident at the baby naming event for the daughter of Buddy and his wife, Beth (Elizabeth Reaser); and when her silk blouse becomes stained with juice, the already disintegrating veneer of civility is utterly destroyed, revealing Mavis to be the callow, selfish fraud she is. In an earlier scene, when Mavis meets Beth, she discovers that Beth teaches emotionally stunted children how to express themselves with a poster indicating emotions. Mavis comments that there is no "neutral" expression, and Beth replies that it is unnecessary, because these children are struggling with showing how they actually feel. This is an ironic observation given Mavis' own difficulty with expressing herself honestly.
Mavis' return to Mercury is an opportunity for her to rediscover herself by looking at the mirror of her past. In this, Young Adult is similar to the black comedy, Grosse Pointe Blank--the films also share some overlap in their soundtracks. The musical selections in Young Adult are especially key, including The Lemonheads' "It's a Shame About Ray" while Matt describes how he became known as the one-time "hate crime guy". Even the opening title montage--featuring "The Concept" by Teenage Fanclub-- depicts Mavis singing in her car while driving to Mercury, coyly and irritatingly rewinding over and over to play the song again and again, itself a representation of how stuck Mavis is on her glorified past. Mavis' fixation on her memories of those good old days from high school is so intense, that when she dresses to meet Buddy at a bar--where Beth is performing--her appearance is reminiscent of the end of Grease, where Olivia Newton-John famously emerges with teased hair and a tight-fitting black outfit, and subsequently secures the affections of her man. (It's fair to say, however, that Mavis shares more in common with Rizzo than Sandy.) When the epiphany comes for Mavis at the end of her "heroine's journey", there is an intentional subversion of this, making her adventure more like a fable--a resolution more reminiscent of A Clockwork Orange. And it wouldn't take much squinting to see in Mavis in her rediscovered "scrunchie" as a surviving member of the ill-fated clique of cool girls from Heathers. What makes Mavis such a tragic figure is that as caustic and superficial as she is, she is also actively demeaning and degrading herself by living as an "idea" of herself as she would like to be, not how she truly is--a form of emotional unbalance sometimes associated with eating disorders like anorexia. It is a strange kind of revenge that awaits the snippy "psychotic prom queen", a slow burn that eats away the soul.
Recommended for: Fans of a surprisingly complex character study about a thoroughly unlikable character, challenging the audience to empathize with Mavis and her warped world view. Though marketed as a comedy, Young Adult is better viewed from the perspective of a cautionary tale, warning about falling into the quagmire of self-indulgent nostalgia.