Mystic Pizza review
Mystic Pizza is a 1988 coming of age romance film starring Julia Roberts. For the film trivia fans out there, this is also Matt Damon’s film debut (he has a bit part where he chuckles during a fancy dinner). It’s set in the small Connecticut town of Mystic — I discovered while writing this review — is in fact a real place.
It starts with a (failed) wedding between Jojo Barbosa (Lili Taylor) and Bill (Vincent D’onofrio) which ends less than well. Meanwhile, two sisters, Kat and Daisy Araujo, who work in the same pizza joint (the titular Mystic Pizza), all develop relationship with three men who all seem to be perfect for them.
The way this film differs from the average coming-of-age film — and it does, in quite a significant way — is that works on the premise that people aren’t always what they seem. Each male character here appears to be one kind of person and, as the drama unfolds, you discover that their lives are much more tumultuous than was originally apparent, or they act in ways which betray their actual personalities.
Mystic Pizza is a feminist film, and it’s also the film I’ve reviewed so far during my quarantine period with the most depth. It’s not so much a film about highlighting men’s flaws (and the ones in this film have a lot of them), but about highlighting the importance of personal accountability. It’s hard to talk about this stuff without going into spoilers, but that kind of is the thesis of this film.
It is also, of course, a film about sisterhood and family, even if those people who feel like family aren’t necessarily related to you; Mystic Pizza is an optimistic film, one that understands in the basic goodness of humanity, the script is imbued with this pretty much from beginning to end. There is one character here (the antagonist, I suppose), who is clearly there to highlight the importance of the aforementioned thesis, and it’s necessary for him to be there for that reason.
Basically, I like this film quite a lot, and here’s another thing: it’s a very could COVID-19 quarantine watch.
