American Honey – Overview/ Review (with Spoilers)

Overview

A young girl escapes a toxic environment to join a traveling band of young adults who sell magazines. All the while taking nearly 3 hours of your life with nothing given in return.

Trigger Warning(s): Short Scene of Inappropriate Touching

Review (with Spoilers)

Noted Actor(s)

Star (Sasha Lane) | Krystal (Riley Keough) | Jake (Shia LaBeouf)

Storyline

With her mom dead, and her new guardians either (possibly) molesting her or expecting her to raise her kids, Star decides to take up this cute boy’s offer to join his group of nomads. With this, she travels across the country selling magazines. Though not always through the most traditional means.

Criticism

It’s Almost 3 Hours of Nothing

As of this point in my life, the longest movie I’ve ever watched was Blue is The Warmest Color, which also is one of my favorite movies. This movie however, honestly does nothing with its almost 3 hour time length. This isn’t some coming of age tale in which Star exponentially grows as a person. We don’t get to really know this ragtag bunch of kids who she hangs out with, and for the whole film it honestly feels like you are waiting for something to happen. With Sky joining Krystal’s crew, and falling for Jake, you think the storyline may begin and it will be a love story filled with jealousy and drama. Eh, not really. Maybe this is an ensemble film where everyone is going to get a chance to do more than say where they are from and then sort of just become another face in the movie. Nope.

Pretty much, this film doesn’t really have a plot. Yeah, things happen to Star, she meets some odd people, but you are never given this feeling that you are watching someone grow as a person. You aren’t given this feeling that Star is learning what it means to be in a family or anything like that. No. This is basically the type of film that only those who are pretentious will praise for its nothingness or the landscapes.

Overall: Negative (Skip It)

While Lane seems interesting, in a Zoe Kravitz sort of way, this movie doesn’t inspire you to become loyal to her career and want to track her progress. It is just a long film which seems like someone’s capstone project which perhaps is trying to say something but like a Kanye West rant, any meaning you find is purely out of hope. Hope that the time you spent, or invested, wasn’t in vain and you can somehow justify the hours you lost of your life.