#Claire Sloma

[sesiondemadrugada]

The Myth of the American Sleepover (David Robert Mitchell, 2010).

[lifewithaview]

Claire Sloma and Annette DeNoyer in "The Myth of the American Sleepover" (2010)

Four young people navigate the suburban wonderland of metro-Detroit looking for love and adventure on the last weekend of summer.

[mrfahrenheit92]

[killer-klowns]

The Myth of the American Sleepover / Après avoir vu une inconnue ouvrir un flacon de gel douche pour en sentir l’odeur, un lycéen s’en va le renifler à son tour.

[cadwalladery]

# 64 - The Myth of the American Sleepover (David Robert Mitchell, 2010)

[disappointingyet]

The Myth Of The American Sleepover

Director David Robert Mitchell Stars Claire Soma, Marlon Morton, Amanda Bauer, Brett Jacobsen USA 2010 Language English 1hr 36mins Colour

Elegantly filmed teen end-of-summer movie

This is one of those films that’s hard to discuss without talking about another movie. Four years after he had made The Myth Of The American Sleepover, David Robert Mitchell directed It Follows, which I think has a strong claim to being one of the key movies of the 2010s. I was checking something about it as I wrote this, and noticed it’s on at a cinema in London this week, seven years after its release. The Myth Of The American Sleepover, meanwhile, is one those debuts that gets probably mostly gets watched because people are curious about what came before the hit.

Mitchell’s first two films share a distinctive visual style, a setting (the Detroit suburbs and abandoned parts of the city), the age, look and general vibe of the characters, an unresolvable is-this-set-now? question (the complete absence of mobile phones in The Myth Of The American Sleepover, for instance, is noticeable). The difference is that It Follows is a horror movie and TMOTS is a one-night-and-its-aftermath coming-of-age story explicitly in the tradition of American Graffiti and Dazed And Confused. And yet, partly because of all it has in common with It Follows, there are moments when I was sure something sinister was about to happen…

It takes place at the end of summer vacation (like American Graffiti), in this case before the start of the high school year for most characters and the college one for a few others. We meet a lot of kids – I’ll briefly introduce the ones we spend more time with. There’s Maggie (Claire Sloma), who is worried she hasn’t done enough that’s memorable over the summer. And Rob (Marlon Morton), who makes out like he’s got game with girls but really doesn’t, and who is obsessed with a girl he sort-of-flirted with in the supermarket when they were helping their moms shop. Claudia (Amanda Bauer) is the new girl in school who already has a boyfriend with a car. Finally, Scott (Brett Jacobsen) feels his break-up is so bad he’s not going to bother to go back to college.

Most of these kids are young enough for big slumber parties to still be a thing. At what point sleepover stop being appropriate, what’s lost when that happens and why the term tends to be used for girls’ gatherings and not the essentially identical events for boys are all things discussed in the movie – these are (like the characters in Dazed And Confused) reflexive kids, very aware that this is a rite of passage, that things are being lost as well as gained as they reach the time of sex, drink and drugs.

It’s an inexperienced cast, many of whom only appeared in this film, but it doesn’t amateurish or non-professional. (And you certainly wouldn’t think of it as a film that only cost $50,000.) On the contrary, because Mitchell is a film-maker whose uses a lot of very clearly composed shots, this doesn’t have that the feel of a debut, of a director figuring out things as he goes along. Then again, he was 35 when he made this, so hardly a kid himself.

I think the juxtaposition of the kids’ bubbling emotions – and the various quests (many pointless) that the characters go on – with the calm and controlled way that it is shot works brilliantly. At the very least, it’s a beautiful film – whether the camera is gazing down suburban sidewalks or we’re in the dark corridors of a labyrinthine abandoned building, even if you aren’t caught up in the adolescent longings and feuds. (I have noticed, though, that Mitchell’s films tend of get fairly low audience ratings at IMBD, Rotten Tomatoes etc – I suspect his art-house approach to popular genres means that a lot of people start watching his movies hoping for something less subtle and well, slow, than what they end up getting.)

As with a lot of teen comedies, you could argue that a dickish male character gets an unmerited good outcome. I think that’s true, although maybe because when I saw this I had also just watched Aaron Katz’s kind-of-similar debut Dance Party USA – which has a truly vile male lead it feels we are meant to be empathise with – it doesn’t seem that bad.

That’s balanced, at least, by Maggie and Claudia, who I think are more interesting characters, and who we spend plenty of time here – I think in the end, this is Maggie’s movie. She’s full of believable contradictions, including having hobby I think would be considered dorky by her peers that actually gives her a super-cool moment.

Is The Myth Of The American Sleepover on the same level as It Follows? No. Is it a terrific movie in its own right? I’m saying yes.

[babszynska]

The Myth Of American Sleepover (2010) David Robert Mitchell

[iliketowatchmoviesalot]

06-29-2015 The Myth Of The American Sleepover (2010) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1174042/

The Myth Of The American Sleepover is the debut feature film by David Robert Mitchell, whose latest effort It Follows was a great financial and creative success. After watching his only two feature films, it has become clear what kind of filmmaker Mitchell aims to be. He likes to present us with slow cinema, in which there is more to be found than what seems.

Mitchell’s own plot follows a couple of groups of high school friends at the last day of summer. They all had a nice summer, but something was missing, something concerning love and lust. Navigating their way to various parties and sleepovers (because what else would you do as a teenager in the Detroit suburbs?) through an illuminating nighttime suburban Detroit, the teenagers find themselves surrounded by both love and hate.

Life as a teenager in the suburbs must be special. Your biggest worry is whether you’re a beer or a liquor kid, and all you care about is chasing that first kiss, saving it for that special someone you’ve been eyeballing for months. The scenes depicting this magical place, no matter how easygoing or empty they might seem at first due to poor acting and plot progression, are actually rich and full of interesting dynamics, slow and sensual. Very interesting things are said in an awkwardly direct manner, it is so weird yet so recognizable, an alternative reality of something you thought you were familiar with. Sadly though, where Mitchell tries to illustrate a realistic night in the lives of teenagers, it all feels far from realistic.

Without thinking too much about it, this is not a good movie. The acting is bad, events that happen will not happen in real life and the encounters between the kids are often awkward (Brett Jacobsen's scenes as the Scott character are actually cringe worthy, he is too old for the part and the worst actor of them all), but there is more to it, something that is strangely intriguing. I can’t put my finger on it exactly, but the dreamlike quality makes me want to see it again. The Myth Of The American Sleepover is not the American Graffiti or Dazed And Confused for the new generation, but does offer some fascinating cinema.

6

[projectorreview]

THE MYTH OF THE AMERICAN SLEEPOVER

David Robert Mitchell's THE MYTH OF THE AMERICAN SLEEPOVER... Leading to the horror of It Follows;

★★★☆☆

Dir: David Robert Mitchell

(2010)

With It Follows garnering rave reviews and about to pounce on audiences, David Robert Mitchell‘s first feature acts like a disconnected coming of age film playing on small town horror film set ups. There are lake side keg parties, Ouija boards and hordes of skinny dipping teens ripe for slashing but The Myth of the American Sleepover is, instead, a hazy…

[publicpools]

Claire Sloma, The Myth of the American Sleepover

[bemeforalittlewhile]

257. The Myth Of The American Sleepover

I think if I saw this movie a year or two ago, I would've been much more happy with it. And I think if I'd seen it a year or two before that, then I'd be overwhelmed by its relevancy without really understanding why I connected to it so much. This is a movie that should be seen by teenagers, and by teenagers I mean people below the age of eighteen - though obviously everyone is different this is how it would've worked for me. Not to say I didn't enjoy it, just that the fact that the main idea tackled (which is nicely summed up in the title) is something I stumbled across quite a few years back, and worked out the details of after.

The majority of the movie is spent showing these intensely melancholic, alive-and-yet-sleepy scenes of the evening. I know the mood of these scenes well because they were the same as the sad fantasies I had as a kid, and still do to an extent. It's why seeing movie and television portrayals of an idealised American social scene such as a house party is something I find so riveting, a feeling I haven't really shook to this day. The movie shows nostalgia in the process, though the characters don't seem to be aware of it. It confused me somewhat - what was the message of the movie. The basic claim to be found is that the concept of being a teenager is entirely mythical - both seen by those who hope to grow up and those who long to return to it. Maybe the movie is trying to say that even those experiencing it still hold to this ideal, and are rarely knocked off course when they see that it's not real. What I found problematic was that the myth that is mentioned is shown to be a reality by the tone of the movie. Where is the reality they speak of evidenced within the movie? To quote Almost Famous (I've been doing that a lot lately):

"When and where does this "real world" occur?"

The most down-to-earth character, who lies about making out with a girl, is also hinted at possibly having had a sort of affair with an attractive mother of one of his friends. It feels like the message is tainted a little by some slightly unrealistic elements. It's only realist storytelling in that people don't get what they want, and in some cases don't even find out what it is that they wanted in the first place. Myths are exposed, fantasies are shown as nothing to do with the real person - they're just projections, an ideal.

This movie made me really happy at the end but it may have been because I was drunk. When a movie relies so much on the tone (which it nails) and a very easily summarised theme, it can be difficult to tell whether it's great or not. I can say for definite that it's at least interesting.

B

[genevieveetguy]

- I don't want you to buy into all the youthful adventure bullshit.  - Come on. What's wrong with that?  - It's a myth.  - A myth of what?  - Being a teenager. They trick you into giving up your childhood with all these promise of adventure. But, once you realize what you lost, it's too late. You can't get it back.

The Myth of the American Sleepover, David Robert Mitchell (2010)

[greencardigan]

Claire Sloma in "The Myth of the American Sleepover" (2010). Directed by David Robert Mitchell.

[courageisaverb-blog-blog]

Claire Sloma in The Myth of the American Sleepover (2010).

A sweet, lyrical, gentle gem of a film.

[somebadwolf]

The Myth of the American Sleepover. <3