Review: Teen Spirit

Style and likability can often go a long way, which is why it's relatively easy to give Teen Spirit, actor Max Minghella's directorial debut, a somewhat grudging pass. Like the pop songs it uses, it's a confection that pleases though not wholly satisfies. Unlike the greatest pop songs, it fails to be transformative and mine surprising depths of emotions.

Starring the ever-compelling and reliable Elle Fanning as a 17-year-old named Violet, the film often plays like a variation between Cinderella, A Star is Born and even Fanning's previous film, The Neon Demon. Violet lives on the Isle of Wight with her struggling Polish immigrant mother (Agnieszka Grochowska). When not sulking her way through high school, Violet works at a restaurant to help make ends meet and singing at a dingy club where, one night, one of the customers, a former opera singer-turned-barfly Vlad (Zlatko Buric), approaches her to praise her talent.

Vlad becomes an unlikely fairy godfather, pretending to be her guardian so she can enter an American Idol-like singing competition. She makes it far enough to be one of the finalists heading to London to perform on the live television finale. Along the way, she does her best to navigate the tricky minefield of the music industry who, as embodied by Rebecca Hall's Simon Cowell-like figure, is ready to cannibalise its potential moneymakers.

The main issue with Teen Spirit may lie in the straightforwardness of its narrative. The recent remake of A Star is Born may be rife with high melodrama like its predecessors, but one felt the personal and professional conflicts of two performers attempting to maintain themselves and their relationship in an unhealthy industry. Vox Lux added a layer of social commentary to its pop fairy tale. Teen Spirit, by comparison, doesn't add anything particularly noteworthy to the rote trajectory undertaken by Violet. There's no narrative thrust and so the slack is palpable. There are no genuine emotional stakes and so the film is drained of interest, despite an excellent soundtrack curated by Marius de Vries and Steven Gizicki and striking cinematography by Autumn Durald Arkapaw.

Teen Spirit

Directed by: Max Minghella

Written by: Max Minghella

Starring: Elle Fanning, Zlatko Buric, Rebecca Hall, Agnieszka Grochowska, Clara Rugaard, Millie Brady