Plain and depressed

The information about the director Peter Bogdanovic is pitiful, and Lucas, who is also the representative of New Hollywood, is also less famous. This film has achieved Oscars for several actors, but no awards for script, director, or film. But Peter was mentioned in Orson Wells' entry, they are two-year-old friends who are more than 20 years apart. The style of black-and-white films is said to have also come from Orson Wells’ suggestions. I don’t know what it would look like if it were changed to color, it would be better or worse... But the black-and-white style is indeed very attractive. Everyone is like a character in an old documentary, and the muddy black-and-white images render a lonely and cold. Atmosphere, even their summer vacation.
Similar themes are very common in American movies, stories about youth growth. The last ball in high school, the last ball game, and the last camping. The girls and boys have to break before the end of high school... Bu La Bu La Bu La ~ ~ Most of these stories are filmed into light comedy, farce, and cruel. Fresh...but in this film, there is not a little bit of vitality that young people should have. From their birth, they are like being cursed to live alone in this land.
The children in the story have to bid farewell to youth, try to love, take on life, and face the seemingly hopeless future alone. But the adults in the town have been indulging in the past, and lamenting that their youth is no longer in the past.
Sonny thought that if his father's Sam died, his best buddy went to North Korea as a soldier, and the obsessed girl went away to go to university. Finally, the only mark of youth, the silly boy Billy also died in a car accident. By this time, the only thing Sonny could find was the coach's wife, the woman who had affair, and two lonely people sitting together.
In addition to the black-and-white film documentary style, the full-film camera has no exaggerated movement and is always looking at it. (It is said that there is only one overhead shot in the whole film, and the rest is head-up.) The long shots of the film are not dazzling at all, and there is no fierce conflict. But this kind of plainness does not obscure the solidity of the director's skills. The beginning is a complicated scene: Sonny driving the truck sees Billy sweeping the street, asks Billy to come to Sam’s pool room, leaves Billy to go out to see JoAnn, and the two come to the cafe together. Along the way, everyone was talking about the rugby game that the children had lost the day before~~ There were many characters in the whole scene, and the scene was complicated.
I like this simple tone, and it's also a good movie. Maybe the director gave up to explore the inner depths of the characters and secrets, and was satisfied with plainness in technique.

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