The Exploding Girl (2009) User Reviews

sweet and heartfelt

[mzimmermann13 · 7/10 · 27 March 2010]

I am always grateful to see films like "The Exploding Girl" that rely on an economy of cinematic technique to tell a story that is about very human topics in way that makes the viewer engage. It is eminently visual, as a move should be. Listening to the audio track would leave you with nothing grasp. The lack of explication only intensified the sense of youthful tragedy for things that go unsaid and opportunities missed. There's always a problem for some people about small, personal films like this one: they aren't big, flashy or hair-raising. What this film zeroed in on is the pain and uncertainty of youth, and especially of young love. To that end, it was poignant and dead on.

The only real problem I have to make about this film is that the filmmakers got too carried away with street-level camera shots that were willing to allow anything and anybody that intervened between the actors to stay in the shot, which resulted in a couple of overlong shots of blurred-out passersby or their body parts to obscure the characters. Okay, I get it that Ivy was just one more passenger on the train; but the indeterminate dark mass of fellow passenger blocking the shot for 15 or 20 seconds was just plain clunky.

Sincere and quietly beautiful

[bluemoon-551-730881 · 7/10 · 30 May 2011]

Zoe Kazan's performance in The Exploding Girl was nuanced and heartfelt, but unfortunately diluted by her extensive screen time. The film spent ENTIRELY too much time lingering on Ivy staring contemplatively into the distance (an indulgence that plagues many indie films). For me, this was the only major flaw, and I felt that the movie overcame it. The cinematography was otherwise really beautiful, looking at the world in ways we don't usually think to look at it. The characters were real people, if not fully developed. They provided an honest look into the lives of modern young adults, whose relationships are sustained but also often trivialized by technology, like Ivy's ever-present cell phone.

This film is subtle, sincere and complex, and I'd recommend it if you're willing to sit through slow-moving scenes and lengthy shots of self-consciously thoughtful Ivy. If nothing else, the last minute of the film is a miraculous moment that absolves all its prior sins.

Sweet slice of life film

[oOgiandujaOo_and_Eddy_Merckx · 7/10 · 22 January 2017]

I've seen this film described as Mumblecore, I think it is a useful starting point to describe the film, though I think it has marked differences. Both this movie and Mumblecore movies in general concern relationships between young white heterosexual folks with relatively privileged upbringings, who are undergoing changes in their lives, or are stuck in the Doldrums hoping for the wind of change. The thing is that Mumblecore often has a warts and all approach, and a comic aspect. So you might get a boy and a girl having a conversation about the internet porn they watch. The difference with The Exploding Girl is that, largely the characters in this movie are shown in a positive light, employing a lot of discretion, and there's no attempt to tickle your funny bone, plus the movie often actually looks really good (as opposed to the hand-held shakiness of Mumblecore).

The two main characters are Ivy and Al. Ivy is studying at Ithaca, but on a break, whilst Al is a friend of many years who stays with her over the period. Al is studying evolutionary biology at college and talks about Goldschmitt's theory of hopeful monsters, which I thought was a really good metaphor for the stage of life Al and Ivy are at, i.e. going from being really good at being kids to learning how to be really good as adults. A hopeful monster is a missing link in evolution between different more steady lifeforms.

Ivy has seizures and is on medication so she has to be careful about drinking, which makes it difficult to engage with a lot of the party life and experimentation that happens at college. Al is sympathetic with this and so they spend time hanging together. Both of them have different romantic interests but seem to do have the potential to do really well together. They're both great young people, which is the thing I liked about the movie, that it showed how great they were. I liked the writing, little things like Al recording his own songs on a tape recorder, with rather overstated lyrics! I felt kinda envious at the end because I wished when I was that age I could have shown a girl the things I was proud about (and vice versa). At one point Al went to see a Zed and Two Noughts (described as an English film called Zoo) with some friends. I watched that alone at about the same age.

They're both pretty gentle and thoughtful. The main reason I wanted to write a comment about the film is that it made me feel like being a bit more gentle and thoughtful. Corollary to that was that I went out and bought a friend a doughnut. It had jam and cream in it, when I came back he said he didn't like cream.

Not much to like.

[lor_ · 1 March 2010]

I don't like "movies" shot on video, and this one is no exception. Its semi-improvised dialog was also a barrier to appreciation, as well as the fledgling director's pretentious approach to photography.

Except for interiors, nearly all the barely-edited shots are long shots using very shallow focus - a technique I thought went out in the '60s. The cast's conversations are shot as if using a hidden camera (the hi-def RED camera is used here), from across the street with intervening cars or pedestrians frequently blocking the principals from our view. Add to that protagonist Mark Rendall's speech impediment (I counted him stating the word "like" 25 times in less than a minute) and you have distancing of the viewer taken to the extreme.

Our heroine played OK enough by Zoe Kazan (she won a dubious Best Actress award from the lowliest of film festivals, the must-miss Tribeca event, which doesn't even take place in Tribeca anymore) remains a blank. She's an epileptic and sure enough, has too many beers, causing a seizure late in the film, but I didn't find that potential disability handled with any insight or relevance to the surrounding film. The story's emphasis on her also was a drag; it reminded me of that Golden Age of porno (now several decades back) when one sometimes experienced a horrific moment, usually during the second or third reel, of realization: "We're going to be stuck looking at this solitary girl for the whole movie!".

Mercifully short, about 75 minutes after removing the slow-slow padding of the end credits, the feature had only two good scenes: one rooftop checking out the pet pigeons that starts as a too-obvious homage to Zoe's grandpa Elia Kazan (classic Saint/Brando scene from ON THE WATERFRONT) and ends up improbably as a Werner Herzog homage, capturing the strange abstract patterns created by flocks of birds in formation that was the signature image of Werner's 2004 film THE WHITE DIAMOND. The other scene I enjoyed was a simple finale ring shot of the hero & heroine asleep in the backseat of a car, unconsciously clasping their hands together.

Low points were a "gee whiz" visit to a SoHo building supposedly once the site of Nikola Tesla's shop -like so many Manhattan non-landmarks it looks like nothing now; and the endless use of cell phones, one of which permitted an entire performance (Zoe's heel of a boyfriend Greg) to be literally phoned in. I am also nominating THE EXPLODING GIRL as the feature film with the lowest costume budget in recent history: it looks like they spent about $3.95 for the heroine's and hero's rumpled, slept-in crappy outfits; ditto ALL the extras (who obviously wore theirs from home).

let's follow Zoe Kazan around

[SnoopyStyle · 4/10 · 3 April 2016]

Ivy (Zoe Kazan) is epileptic and returns home to Brooklyn on summer break from college. Her friend Al joins her to sleep on her couch when his room is rented out by his parents. She struggles to stay in contact with boyfriend Greg. Greg gets into a car accident with his high school friend Rebecca and decides to stay with her in the hospital. Ivy starts hanging out with Al.

Don't get me wrong. Zoe Kazan is lovely. She's beautiful and has a charm about her. It doesn't mean that watching her alone for most of the movie is particularly exciting. She has some interesting phone calls. She really needs the second to be in more of the movie and he needs to be played by somebody more compelling. I understand the idea of being alone in a crowded city and losing one's connection. However, this movie lacks the drive to propel it.

This is really what love feels like

[cgearheart · 10/10 · 27 February 2022]

I was expecting this movie to be good. It met my expectations in that regard. I wasn't expecting it to hit so close to my heart. I wanted so badly for the two characters to be together. The little subtleties of him feeding her soup when she was sick, her getting jealous that she was talking about other girls, her waiting for him to get home.. it was just so sweet. Those are the little things you notice when you fall in love.

10/10.

I love this writer director

[juanmuscle · 10/10 · 20 February 2021]

He did a fun dyke film that is so sweet where that cute Brit chick is a mosnter! must see, this was really cute and fun and it moved at a pace that made you melt into the movie , really fun and endeared to me quite fondly!

Slow-moving character study of little importance

[napierslogs · 3/10 · 17 October 2010]

The title "The Exploding Girl" is figurative not literal. I would add "of course" but that's not as obvious given movies nowadays. This is a low-budget, independent character study.

It's about Ivy on college break, back home in New York City. Ivy struggles with love and friendship. And the film-maker shows us this with really slow-moving, seemingly unimportant scenes mired in the noisy streets of New York City. I know the city is basically supposed to be its own character, but the loud, constant bus and car noises and obstruction just lowered the quality of the film.

Zoe Kazan's Ivy is very cute and likable, but even with her epilepsy, her college problems seem minor compared to the stress that other college girls experience. Her boyfriend back at college was painted one-dimensionally. And although I didn't mind Al, the reason given for him moving in with Ivy was very odd and never explained.

It's called a "discreet character study". I will agree with that in the sense that meaning was hard to find, dialogue was indiscernible and silent at times, and reasons for few things happening was kept private from the audience. The brilliance displayed in the poster is only found once in the film, and is not enough to watch it. "The Exploding Girl" is only for the very discerning film viewer who likes slow-moving character studies of little importance.

What The.....?!?!

[mcjensen-05924 · 1/10 · 18 July 2023]

Okay, are we just supposed to ignore the whole silly, contrived plot device to have these two end up living in the same home. His parents not only rented his room out even though they knew he was coming home, but also never bothered to tell him. So he ends up there, and they still won't let him stay in their house. They must really hate their son!! So immediately there's this ridiculously stupid situation to overcome before trying to settle in and enjoy the movie. It never happened for me. The lazy writing just insisted on rearing itself in eye rolling scenes. Zoe is lovely as alway, Unfortunately there's nothing her to showcase her amazing abilities and the total goober of a friend adds absolutely nothing to the movie. He reminds me of a pile of dog doo on the living room floor that nobody bothered to clean up. The conversations on the phone with the boyfriend are so unconvincing and lame it made my head hurt. Dialogue is just so terrible in this. Like she will tell her friend that a gift is amazing and she loves it and what's his response? Do you like it? She just said she loved it two seconds ago!! Or she'll describe her pain and symptoms to her doctor and she will reply with Are you okay? In fact if I had a doller for every time someone asked that question in this stupid movie I'd be set for a few weeks anyway. Disastrous effort.