Big Time Adolescence (2020) poster
2020 · comedy · drama · coming-of-age

Big Time Adolescence

Directed by Jason Orley1h 31m2020
ElsewhereIMDb6.917kRT86%Metacritic64
  • warm
  • brisk
  • intimate
Movie DNA

Warm, kinetic, measured comedy / drama, grounded in texture. Ambivalent, intimate, measured, hand-scored across twelve axes of taste.

How every film is hand-scored →

A seemingly bright and mostly innocent 16-year-old named Mo attempts to navigate high school under the guidance of his best friend Zeke, an unmotivated-yet-charismatic college dropout. Although Zeke genuinely cares about Mo, things start to go awry as he teaches Mo nontraditional life lessons in drug dealing, partying, and dating. Meanwhile, Mo’s well-meaning dad tries to step in and take back the reins of his son’s upbringing.

Our read · Big Time Adolescence (2020) reads as a warm, kinetic, grounded comedy · drama · coming-of-age entry — measured in intensity, intimate in scope, measured in temperature, ambivalent in outlook. Hand-scored on twelve axes of taste — mood, pacing, weirdness, hope, stakes, humour, reality, density, warmth, auteur, intensity, and era — with a derived palette drawn from its dominant cinematography.

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The shape of Big Time Adolescence

Tonight, this looks like

What watching it is actually like.

You want a sharp teen coming-of-age with Pete Davidson as a toxic mentor.

ends bittersweetit stays with yousteady all the waygrips by minute 6attention 3/5breezes by
Date nightWith friendsSoloWith parentsKids around
Heads-updrug use

Skip it tonightSkip if stoner bad-influence comedy and underage partying feel too grim tonight.

DNA · twelve axes

The reading.

Each axis is hand-scored — not derived from votes or genre averages. The marker shows where this film sits; the gradient fill uses the film's own cinematography palette.

Mood · HeavyCosy
Pacing · Slow-burnKinetic
Intensity · GentleExtreme
Weirdness · ConventionalSurreal
Hope · NihilisticRedemptive
Stakes · IntimateEpic
Humour · NoneBroad
Reality · GroundedFantastical
Density · SparseTwisty
Warmth · ColdTender
Auteur · TransparentSignature
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