20th Century Women (2016) poster
2016 · drama · comedy

20th Century Women

Directed by Mike Mills1h 58m2016
ElsewhereIMDb7.352kRT88%Metacritic83TMDB7.31k
  • measured
Movie DNA

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

How every film is hand-scored →

In 1979 Santa Barbara, California, Dorothea Fields is a determined single mother in her mid-50s who is raising her adolescent son, Jamie, at a moment brimming with cultural change and rebellion. Dorothea enlists the help of two younger women – Abbie, a free-spirited punk artist living as a boarder in the Fields' home and Julie, a savvy and provocative teenage neighbour – to help with Jamie's upbringing.

Our read · 20th Century Women (2016) reads as a neutral, measured, grounded drama · comedy entry — measured in intensity, intimate in scope, measured in temperature, ambivalent in outlook, with a strong directorial signature. 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 20th Century Women

Tonight, this looks like

What watching it is actually like.

You want warm 1970s coming-of-age talk about mothers, feminism, and growing up.

ends bittersweetit stays with youmeditativegrips by minute 8attention 4/5earns its length
Date nightWith friendsSoloWith parentsKids around
Heads-updrug use

Skip it tonightYou need plot momentum more than gentle observational character study 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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