Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Paper Towns (2015)

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Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 07-25-2015, 05:39 PM:

CINEMA: Cinemark Movies 12, Ames, IA
AUDITORIUM: 6
PRESENTATION: Barco Digital (probably 2K)
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: None [Cool]

RATING: Three stars (out of four)

HOLY CRAP. NEW SEATS! Cinemark built this plex in 1998 with a discount house in mind, but opened it as first-run. It was one of Cinemark's last (if not THE last) slope builds. The seats were these godawful barely padded thin stiff heavy industrial cloth things. Horrible. The new ones have a plastic shell, a velvety cover and far better padding. Nice headrests and padded armrests to boot. The building still has a Tinseltown interior with Cinemark purple, green, orange, pink, and checkerboard everywhere. Which is fine with me.

THE PLOT: A girl gets revenge, then disappears. Wackiness ensues.

Here's another Scott Neustadter (The Fault In Our Stars, The Spectacular Now, 500 Days of Summer) screenplay based on a young adult novel by John Green (The Fault In Our Stars) that finally hits on all cylinders. Neustadter's previous related movies always seem to do a lot really well, then do something really dumb to make them less than they should have been.

Not the case here. While the whole thing is basically adorable teen fluff, it's adorable teen fluff done right from beginning to end.

A road trip movie that is simply an enjoyable ride.

Posted by Buck Wilson (Member # 5885) on 07-26-2015, 08:29 AM:

I love your reviews.

I so want to visit one of those "bright" 90's Cinemark locations...

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 08-10-2015, 11:26 AM:

This movie tried so damn hard to be The Girl Next Door.

Unfortunately it didn't even come close.

The Girl Next Door if anyone hasn't seen it is worth checking out. I have seen it multiple times now and found I enjoy it more with repeat viewing. This one, well, not really. It wasn't a total waste of time, but definitely something I'll never bother to watch again.

Posted by Matt Russell (Member # 8989) on 08-10-2015, 01:23 PM:

Girl Next Door is a classic in terms of sex comedies. Not as raunchy as American Pie or Porky's, the plot is actually very enjoyable, as the main character has the decide whether or not he wants to go to the "next level" with his new girlfriend after he finds out she's in the porn industry. It's cute but wildly funny at the sometime. Paper Towns has the same feeling as GND in terms of story, but I wish Margo had a little bit more of an edge to her like Danielle in Girl Next Door then just getting revenge on the people who wronged her, which felt like a generic idea. I still liked Paper Towns though, it's just nothing you haven't seen before, in terms of both a comedy and a mystery.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 08-10-2015, 10:58 PM:

the cast in this actually worked (although it made me feel really old) The road trip distance and time duration wasn't quite right though.