American Honey (2016)

I really liked this dreamy telling of a gritty story about a teenager who joins a band of other homeless kids traveling the country selling magazine subscriptions and partying. Jack didn't, primarily because of its excessive length (without which it would have been much less dreamy) of 2:43.

In her acting debut, Sasha Lane, who turned 21 in September, is remarkable as the lead, a fearless girl named Star. Some have called this a career-making role for Shia LaBeouf (when I last wrote about him in The Company You Keep, I said he was "less annoying" than in his previous movie) and he is compelling as the mercurial Jake. And you won't forget Riley Keogh, who is Elvis Presley's eldest grandchild and Lisa Marie's daughter. Keough was in but not blogged for The Runaways, Magic Mike, and Mad Max: Fury Road. And here her ice queen Krystal is formidable. Except for a cameo by Will Patton (last blogged for Meek's Cutoff), most of the others in the large cast are inexperienced actors who nonetheless contribute much to the picture.

Director/writer Andrea Arnold (most recently in these pages for Fish Tank) has crafted quite the story of Star and her new "family," and, though I don't disagree the movie is way too long, I didn't hate the cutaway shots of bug and birds on wires. Most of it was shot with natural or available light. It's also a major trigger of motion picture motion sickness (see my running list of MPMS movies here) due to lots of hand held camera work, including while running.

No composer is credited, and none needed, because of many kick ass songs, to which the kids sing along and/or dance jubilantly. Imdb lists 27 songs, and the album's 19 songs, available for sale at the usual sites, can be streamed on spotify for your listening pleasure.

Rated 81% by critics and 77 by audiences on Rotten Tomatoes, the movie won the Jury Prize and Special Mention of the Ecumenical Jury at Cannes last winter, and, just this morning, Lane was nominated for the Breakthrough Award at the Gotham Independent Awards. You may not want your teenagers to see this as it contains graphic sex, nudity, really bad behavior, and foul language. But many patient adults will enjoy it.