Latest news with #AlamoDrafthouseCinema
Geek Tyrant
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
Crunchyroll Is Bringing Monthly 'Anime Nights' to Theaters Across the U.S. — GeekTyrant
Crunchyroll is about to make your trips to the theater a monthly event. The streaming giant announced during San Diego Comic-Con that it's launching a brand-new program called Crunchyroll Anime Nights, a nationwide theatrical celebration of anime that kicks off this October. Unlike the limited screenings we've been used to in past years, Crunchyroll is going big. Anime movies have already been making huge waves in theaters recently thanks to hits like Jujutsu Kaisen 0 , Demon Slayer: Mugen Train , and more, but now Crunchyroll is making sure there's something for fans to enjoy every single month on the big screen. Crunchyroll describes Anime Nights as a way to 'honor the past, elevate the present, and celebrate the future of anime.' These events will take place on the third Monday of every month across theaters in the United States, and more than 225 theaters nationwide will be part of the program, including major chains like Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, AMC Theatres, Regal, Cinemark Theatres, Harkins Theatres, and Landmark Cinemas. The first event happens on October 20, 2025, featuring the U.S. debut of Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid: A Lonely Dragon Wants to Be Loved . That's just the beginning. November and December already have exciting lineups in store: November 17, 2025 – OVERLORD – A Celebration of the Anime's 10th Anniversary December 15, 2025 – Crunchyroll Anime Nights: Secret Sneak Peek! (Yep, a surprise event teasing new anime before it hits streaming!) Crunchyroll is looking to make this a major part of the anime fan experience, one that could even expand into 2026 with more big premieres and special screenings. Theatrical anime has exploded in popularity over the past few years. What used to be limited to a handful of special screenings has now become a regular fixture in U.S. theaters. Crunchyroll and Sony Pictures Entertainment are taking this momentum and turning it into something consistent with a monthly event that gives fans a reason to gather and celebrate their favorite series on the big screen. And Crunchyroll wants this to feel like more than just a movie night. As Mitchel Berger, Executive Vice President of Commerce at Crunchyroll, explains: 'Anime Nights offers more than a screening – it's a shared experience that honors the art form, invites fans into the world of creators, and brings anime to life in a theatrical setting. Crunchyroll is committed to the theatrical experience, and there's something powerful about watching beloved anime surrounded by friends and fellow fans in a theater. It's a unique opportunity to connect to the anime community every month to honor stories they love.' So, starting this fall, anime is taking over theaters in a big way. With Crunchyroll Anime Nights, fans will have a consistent opportunity to enjoy their favorite shows and movies on the big screen, share the experience with the community, and even get sneak peeks at upcoming releases.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Moving iMage Transforms Four Alamo Drafthouse Cinema Locations in Texas with Cutting-Edge Barco Laser Projection and Dolby Atmos Sound
Austin & San Antonio, Texas & Fountain Valley, California--(Newsfile Corp. - July 29, 2025) - Moving iMage Technologies, Inc. (NYSE American: MITQ) "MiT", a leading provider of cutting-edge out-of-home entertainment technology and services for cinema, Esports, stadiums and arenas, today announced four substantial technology refresh initiatives to incorporate laser projection with HDR by Barco and Doby Atmos immersive audio at Alamo Drafthouse Cinema's Lakeline and Mueller locations in Austin, TX and its Stone Oak and Park North locations in San Antonio, TX. The projects are expected to be completed in the coming months. Click here for images Project Highlights Installation of dozens of state-of-the-art Barco SP4K laser projectors, delivering exceptional image clarity and vibrant color accuracy, for unmatched visual presentations. Integration of Barco ICMP Alchemy servers to provide advanced content management and seamless playback capabilities, streamlining and enhancing operational efficiencies. Integration, installation, and commissioning of HDR by Barco technology in one auditorium at each location. High Dynamic Range (HDR) is Barco's next-level cinema technology that artfully directs light to create darker darks, brighter brights, and a full spectrum of vibrant, life-like colors. Design, project management, integration, and installation of immersive Dolby Atmos systems at each location that deliver a multidimensional surround sound experience to audiences. Proprietary MiT Products MIT S5 projector pedestals will be utilized with each projector to deliver optimal system stability and performance. IMC25 Automation will be deployed to interface with the cinema projectors, servers, audio processors and pre-feature entertainment systems and provide centralized control of each auditorium. IS-30 AC power spike arrestor and current filter conditioners will be utilized to optimize and safeguard the power supply for the upgraded equipment. Mueller auditorium imageTo view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: Chris Drazba, Chief Development Officer, Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, commented, "We are very pleased with the quality of advice and service received from the Moving iMage team over the years. Their attention to detail and ability to keep projects running smoothly from start to finish has made them a trusted extension of our development team and a long-term partner in helping Alamo Drafthouse deliver immersive experiences to our customers." Moving iMage President and COO, Francois Godfrey, added, "We are proud to support Alamo Drafthouse in setting the standard for modern cinemas through its investments in premium, next-generation technologies and enhanced guest experiences. These new projects, which follow last year's cinema technology upgrades at Alamo's Las Colinas and Richardson locations in Dallas and their new build in Indianapolis, highlight the success of our collaboration and MiT's broad capabilities and leadership in cinema technology and integration services." Lakeline exterior imageTo view an enhanced version of this graphic, please visit: About Alamo Drafthouse Cinema ( Drafthouse Cinema was founded in 1997 as a single-screen mom and pop repertory theater in Austin, TX. Twenty-seven years later, with 44 locations and counting, Alamo Drafthouse has been called "the best theater in America" by Entertainment Weekly and "the best theater in the world" by Wired. Alamo Drafthouse has built a reputation as a movie lover's oasis not only by combining best-in-class food and drink service with the movie-going experience, but also introducing unique programming and high-profile, star-studded special events. Alamo Drafthouse continues to expand its brand in new and exciting ways, including the American Genre Film Archive, a non-profit film archive dedicated to preserving, restoring and sharing film, and with several new theaters announced for this year and beyond. About Moving iMage Technologies ( a focus on innovation, service, and quality, Moving iMage Technologies ("MiT) is a trusted partner in delivering state-of-the-art out-of-home entertainment environments. Founded in 2003, MiT provides products, integrated systems design, custom engineering, proprietary products, software, and installation services for cinemas, screening rooms, postproduction facilities, high-end home theaters, Esports venues, arenas, stadiums, and other entertainment spaces. MiT manufactures a broad line of digital cinema peripherals in the U.S., including automation systems, projector pedestals/bases, projector lifts, hush boxes, direct-view LED frames, lighting fixtures and dimmers, power management devices, operations software, and Esports platforms. It also distributes and integrates cinema equipment from Barco, Sharp (NEC) Digital Cinema, Christie Digital, LEA Professional, Dolby, GDC, JBL/Crown, LG, Meyer Sound, Q-SYS, QSC, Samsung and others. MiT's Caddy Products division designs and sells cupholders, concession trays, and venue accessories that enhance concession sales and improve the guest experience. Forward-Looking StatementsAll statements above that are not purely about historical facts, including, but not limited to, those in which we use the words "believe," "anticipate," "expect," "plan," "intend," "estimate," "target" and similar expressions, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. While these forward-looking statements represent our current judgment of what may happen in the future, actual results may differ materially from the results expressed or implied by these statements due to numerous important factors. Our filings with the SEC provide detailed information on such statements and risks and should be consulted along with this release. To the extent permitted under applicable law, we assume no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. Follow us on X: @movingimagenewsFollow us on LinkedIn: MiT on LinkedIn MITQ Investor Relations ContactsChris Eddy or David CollinsCatalyst IRmitq@ or 212-924-9800 To view the source version of this press release, please visit Error while retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data
Chicago Tribune
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Why Alamo's preshow is one of the last, best reasons to go to a movie theater
The Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, located in the new plastic heart of Wrigleyville, tucked alongside the crush of tourists and bachelorette parties and bars crawls and soulless developments, is not the first place I would I think I would want to arrive early. And yet, I have to, and get annoyed when I don't. Not because of the food they serve (not bad, not cheap). Or lines at the box office (nonexistent, that being a pre-pandemic concern). You must arrive early — 30 minutes before a movie's showtime — just for the Alamo preshow. The preshow is a reminder that 75% of the magic of going to a movie is waiting for the movie. It's a reminder of why you bothered to leave the house to watch a movie. I'm not talking about trailers. They show many, many trailers. But only after this preshow. (Whatever you came to see, as in most theaters, starts 20 or so minutes later than scheduled, preshow and all.) No, I'm talking about the 30 minutes of parodies and oddities, archival PSAs and music videos, dance party footage, old toy ads, history lessons, workout videos, Bollywood numbers, interview clips, film essays and whatever else Alamo cobbles together, usually tied to the theme of the movie you're about to see. If you went to the hilariously sadistic 'Final Destination Bloodlines,' you got Tom and Jerry cartoons and satiric educational training films. 'Barbie' got a Greta Gerwig appreciation and vintage toy commercials and clips of Ryan Gosling dancing as a child performer. Captain America movies get a slow-burn Ken Burns-inspired retelling of the history of Marvel's Captain America films. Recently, I saw the new 'Jurassic Park' and for 30 minutes before trailers, we got bizarro dinosaur films and a history of a Finnish metal band for children, Hevisaurus. Showing up half an hour before a movie begins is a lot to ask of an audience, especially one that would rather be streaming at home. But in my household, when we go to Alamo, arriving too early is ritual, and since I have an 8-year-old who needs to see every unnecessary live-action Disney retrofit, that preshow is often the only highlight. Alamo has been doing preshows since it began 18 years ago in Austin, Texas; as part of an expansion in 2023, it finally came to Chicago, was bought by Sony Pictures and now has a few dozen theaters across the country. It's not the only movie theater in town that knows how to warm-up an audience just sitting there, getting comfortable, fiddling with phones, eating most of the popcorn before the movie starts: A few blocks away, the Music Box Theatre has had a live organist for ages. These bonus flourishes seem minor, but they should be studied by larger chains that go sweaty touting their investments in laser projection and 4DX immersion and Dolby 3D soundscapes. A good preshow is so simple, low-tech and warm as to feel old-fashioned; it's an amuse-bouche that acknowledges, yes, you have a perfectly fine TV at home, maybe even a better sound system, but, as Nicole Kidman says in her famous preshow speech for AMC Theatres, Keeping the audience in an anticipatory spell as long as possible — that's the point. Tom Cruise, Kidman's ex-husband, knows this, too: Before 'Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning,' he greets the audience in a short clip, thanking them for doing something so communal. Cruise, on a one-man impossible mission to save the theater experience even if it means hanging off a biplane, delivered a similar preshow before 'Top Gun: Maverick.' That these people go to such lengths in the service of framing another perfectly entertaining though forgettable night at the movies is what makes the preshow, often playing before the forgettable, so touching. I don't remember a lot about 'Final Reckoning,' for example, but I remember Alamo's exhaustive primer of 30 years of 'Mission: Impossible' plots and MacGuffins. Without a disassembly, I would have been as lost as I bet a lot of audiences were. It also got me more invested in the experience than I had expected. Like Cruise, the Alamo preshow knows the last thing we want in the streaming age is to leave home then feel nothing. Preshow entertainment, of course, goes way back. In the first days of cinema, movies themselves were preshow entertainment, a kind of intermission between live vaudeville acts. Once features were the main attraction, there were cartoons, newsreels, shorts. During the Great Depression, to lure people back, theater owners in the Midwest would have giveaway nights, awarding dinnerware and even pets. Disney wildlife shorts preceded Disney films. As drive-ins became popular in the 1950s, theaters focused on concession stands: That iconic 'Let's All Go to the Lobby' spot starring dancing hot dogs and popcorn bags may be the most famous preshow entertainment ever. For decades, the Showcase Cinemas chain was known for sending ushers into theaters, shaking cans and soliciting change for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. But gradually, advertising took over. Trailers were the whole preshow, alongside traditional TV ads, PSAs about theater policies, and in the late 1970s and early 1980s, even lobbying campaigns from theater owners spooked by cable TV, warning of the death of 'free TV.' Laird Jimenez, the director of video content for Alamo, thinks of their preshow as continuing the older tradition, rarely practiced now, fed by the online libraries of archival footage and original video floods that the 21st century has been awash with. (Alamo gets permission, though does not pay, the creators of any material it pulls from YouTube or elsewhere.) But Jimenez also admits, they're leaving money, a lot of money, on the table in the service of a theater experience. '(The preshow) is probably not the economically best decision considering the labor hours it takes to make them and the fact it's screen time we could use — that's money we're losing, not running Chrysler ads.' A recent poll of theater owners, reported by Variety, and conducted by analyst Stephen Follows and the online trade publication Screendollars, found that more than 55% of movie exhibitors believe the movie theater, as an institution, has maybe 20 years left. And still, other than movie trailers, Alamo does not run advertising, as a company policy. Instead, as Rome burns, a team of three young guys in its Austin headquarters, with backgrounds in film school, film preservation, video stores and film festivals, pump out five to 10 30-minute preshows a week. There is some recycling, but almost every new movie that opens — as well as older repertoire films it shows, such as 'Jaws' and 'Mean Girls' — gets a new 30-minute preshow. 'A lot of original pieces we make simply come out of a passion we have for something,' said Ray Loyd, senior content producer. So, instead of car ads, you get a history of Black westerns, relayed by Black film scholars. Or an old TV spot with George Takei, in Sulu regalia, shilling for the Milwaukee County Transit System. Or a study of how 'Dune' influenced '70s progressive rock. Or director Edgar Wright explaining the nuances of car chases. Or an essay on questions left by 'Cats,' including: If cats have fur naturally, why do cats in the film 'Cats' wear fur coats? The recent 'Nosferatu' got an extensive history of the vampire genre. 'My favorite stuff is when we can show the breadth of everything in movies,' said Zane Gordon-Bouzard, an Alamo video producer. 'We have this platform and we can show people there is a rich world of not only cinema, but videos, old TV — all worth preserving and watching.' The result, sitting there waiting for your movie, is like having a friend show you this cool YouTube sketch, and now this insane commercial, and now this weird music video, then stopping to describe how 'Lilo & Stitch' fits into the rich tradition of knockoffs of 'E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.' Surprisingly, in this instance, with an audience, it's worth the ticket.
Time Out
14-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
The founder of Alamo Drafthouse is debuting a swanky new movie theater in Chelsea
How to get Tim League, the founder of the famously strict Alamo Drafthouse Cinema chains, to allow phones and chatter during a screening? Metro Private Cinema, his upcoming venture in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood, is the unique, if pricey, solution. Opening sometime this summer (late August or early September is the current target), the 20-screen complex will allow cinephiles to rent plush screening rooms for groups of four to 20 people. Each four-hour booking includes a pre-movie dinner and your pick of flick. Recent releases are prioritized, with a rotating selection of classics (all-timers like Jaws and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and off-beat ones, like Donnie Darko and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, are first on the slate) available. Want to screen an even deeper cut? Metro will find it for you, for an extra fee. Speaking of fees, experiences range from $200, for the smallest room, to $1,000 for the 20-count. Meals are $100 per person with alcoholic drinks upping the bill an extra $50 or more. But League maintains this is a way to eventize moviegoing at a time when the practice is in peril of disappearing, and when social media is filled with complaints about bad behavior, service and quality at most multiplexes. On par with Alamo's creative upscale cuisine, menus will be seasonal, and some films will get their unique culinary adventures. (Look out for special Paddington 2 and Goodfellas menus, and Les Blank's 1980 documentary, Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers, will have a particularly pungent pairing.) And, from the looks of the theater's website, rooms will have vibe-setting features like vinyl record players and a variety of seating options, for those who prefer a spine-correcting stool over a comfy couch. Stationed near many of New York's most accessible subway lines, this first iteration will serve as a pilot for future Metro Private Cinemas.
Atlantic
06-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Atlantic
What the Great Teen Movies Taught Us
In the early spring, I caught a preview at my local Alamo Drafthouse Cinema for its forthcoming stoner-classics retrospective: snippets of Monty Python's Life of Brian; Tommy Boy; a few Dada-esque cartoons perfect for zonking out on, post-edible. The audience watched quietly until Matthew McConaughey, sporting a parted blond bowl cut and ferrying students to some end-of-year fun, delivered a signature bit of dialogue. 'Say, man, you got a joint?' he asked the kid in the back seat. 'Uhhh, no, not on me, man.' 'It'd be a lot cooler if you did,' he drawled. The crowd, including me, went wild. Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused, in which a fresh-faced McConaughey appears as Wooderson, the guy who graduated years back but still hangs with the high-school kids, is that kind of teen movie: eternally jubilance-inspiring. Set in 1976 and released in 1993, it's a paean to the let-loose ethos of a certain decade of American high school. And boy do these kids let loose. On the final day of the school year, a group of rising seniors in small-town Texas set out with custom-made paddles to whack the bottoms of soon-to-be freshmen, and then take a couple of them to a 'beer bust' out by a soaring light tower. Along the way, they shoot some pool, cruise the town, smoke joint after joint. If the film has a point, it's that the teens want to party all night and still wake up in time to buy Aerosmith tickets in the morning. (The last frame shows them driving into the sunrise.) What makes Dazed and Confused so pleasurable is its adherence to a devil-may-care freedom just inside the bounds of believability. You can really imagine a group of mid-'70s high-school boys throwing a bowling ball through a car window. You can really envision (especially if you went to my high school, which held on to similar hazing rituals well into the 2000s) senior girls screaming at rising ninth graders, ordering them to lie on the ground and 'fry like bacon' while being squirted with ketchup and mustard. And if you're as jealous of a '70s upbringing as I am (largely thanks to Dazed and Confused ), you can daydream about a version of adolescent life with nary an adult to correct you or even shake their head. Only the school's football coach tries to hold the line on drugs, and he's roundly mocked. Wild partying is just a rite of initiation. As Bruce Handy—a journalist, critic, and fellow Dazed and Confused fan—writes in his new book, Hollywood High: A Totally Epic, Way Opinionated History of Teen Movies, relaxing the strictures on kids in the throes of puberty and letting them call the shots has been the modus operandi of the teen filmscape for decades. Teenagers coalesced as a demographic group and a niche market in the 1940s and soon became box-office-boosting conveyors of cool. By the time the first batches of Baby Boomers were graduating from high school in the mid-1960s, teens had arrived as 'the prime movers of American popular culture,' Handy writes. Over the ensuing six decades, 'teenagers and teen movies would come of age hand in hand,' stirring moral panic along the way. In Handy's astute and spirited account, grown-ups live in fear of the culture that teens have helped create—unnerved again and again by what they learn on-screen about an age cohort hell-bent on charting its own detour on the way to adulthood. 'They're just afraid that some of us might be having too good a time,' the coolest kid in Dazed and Confused concludes about his elders. As the genre has evolved, their unease has extended well beyond that. From the start, Handy argues, the on-screen adventures in teen movies have been targeted to a double audience of rebellious teens and anxious adults. Kindly caretakers of youths in prewar times (Judge Hardy in the Hardy films helps his aw-shucks son navigate chaste first kisses, etc.) retreat from view. Early-1950s headlines such as 'Youth Delinquency Growing Rapidly Over the Country' are the backdrop to Jim Stark (James Dean) in Rebel Without a Cause (1955), roaring across the California landscape in his Mercury Coupe, morally adrift and crying out for adult guidance he never gets. Posters billed the movie as a challenging drama of today's juvenile violence, savvily marketing it to hell-raisers and handwringers alike. Handy, who presides as a proudly pro-teen Boomer, is a clear-eyed critic who's not about to buy into the panic himself. Digging into movie backstories, budgets, ticket sales, and social trends, he is interested in how the films repeatedly glamorize adolescent acting-out in charged and timely ways. He situates the Beach Party series of 1963–65 ('crap, but interesting crap') amid early-'60s worries that teens would take over the culture. Watch out, warned a 1963 book called Teen-Age Tyranny; they're 'permanently' imposing 'teenage standards of thought, culture, and goals.' Or lack of goals. The seven Beach Party films feature airheads enjoying sandy weekend fun, no teachers or parents in sight—though an anthropologist on the sidelines scrutinizes youthful mating habits through a telescope. The fact that no sex was in sight either (even visible navels were deemed off-limits) didn't stand in the way of ad copy that deployed titillation and terror. 'When 10,000 Bodies Hit 5,000 Blankets …' invited thousands of viewers to fill in the blank with their imagination. In Handy's telling, teen culture rapidly became a lucrative feedback loop: Teenagers repeat the behaviors they see on-screen, Hollywood in turn tailors scripts to shifting concerns about kids, and the results both lure teens to theaters and encourage further antics—rattling adults even more in the process. Surging late-'70s drug-use statistics dovetail with Cameron Crowe's Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), based on the year Crowe spent undercover at a real California high school. Its memorable pothead character, Spicoli (a young Sean Penn), literally rolls out of a smoke-filled VW van on his first day of school—and has the last laugh, flouting the history teacher who tries to set the wasted kid straight. But the movie makes room for more sober realism too, with its teen-pregnancy subplot and kids juggling jobs. These teens aren't just hedonistic idlers; they've prematurely saddled themselves with grown-up burdens they can't always handle. And in John Hughes's films, teens do what adults dread most: cast blame on their elders. In The Breakfast Club (1985), the kids consigned to Saturday-morning detention (a microcosm of high-school social tribes) conclude that it's their 'wintry, stone-faced' parents, as Handy puts it, who 'are the root of all their children's problems.' Hughes, who insisted on happy endings, grants the students victory: The film wraps with a freeze-frame of a freshly released detainee's defiantly raised fist—and it belongs to Bender (Judd Nelson), the disaffected, angry loner most inclined to stick it to the grown-ups. More recently, the flavor of the moral panic has changed in a way that Handy doesn't quite latch on to. Adults were once afraid of teens: the greasers of Rebel, the boppers of Beach Party, the stoners of Fast Times, the screwups of The Breakfast Club. They were threats to the order of things, both too grown-up to control and not grown-up enough to properly wield control themselves. But since the arrival of the 21st century, teen films have taken a turn. Adults have become afraid for teens, and newly distressed about their own role (or lack thereof) in the troubles facing them. The mode of anxiety has shifted, and the culture of concern is playing catch-up. As A ninth grader in April 1999, I came home one Tuesday to a news bulletin that showed a boy dangling from a window at Columbine High School, desperately trying to escape two schoolmates on a shooting rampage. That day, real-life teenagers entered a new era, one of victimhood. The fraught terrain has steadily expanded since, and now encompasses fears about social media's pernicious influence on teens, their growing anxiety and loneliness, their future in a polarized society on a warming planet. Handy does not underrate the bleak fallout in teen films of 'our current wretched century.' He also rightly identifies the rise of 'girl power' as a force in teen culture, and the popularity and quality of girl-centered movies, even as old-school sex romps (the American Pie franchise) never disappear. Tina Fey's 2004 film, Mean Girls, is near the top of his list of best teen films, as it is of mine, and he embeds it in a discussion of articles and parenting guides (Fey drew on Rosalind Wiseman 's Queen Bees & Wannabes) that sounded the alarm about aggression and insecurity in the world of American girlhood. But in emphasizing bullying's links to the usual teen-film theme of high-school tribalism, Handy stops short of recognizing the portrayal of it, both comic and horrifying, as part of a larger shift toward incisive psychological probing that skewed dark: When Fey watched the movie with test audiences, she took note that girls were responding to it less as a teen movie and more 'like a reality show.' They weren't 'exactly guffawing.' Recently out of high school myself at the time, though I laughed, I also remember wincing at the no-safe-spaces aura of the cruelty. In his choice of other 21st-century films to focus on, Handy veers away from depictions of teens whose newly stressful struggles for autonomy portend dire consequences. He omits Sofia Coppola's excellent and grim feature-length directorial debut, The Virgin Suicides (based on Jeffrey Eugenides's 1993 novel and set in the mid-'70s), which was released with a sickening thud in 2000—a bookend of sorts to the freewheeling laxity of Dazed and Confused, set in the same era. When 13-year-old Cecilia, the youngest of five spectrally beautiful sisters whose severe parents keep them cloistered, throws herself out a second-story window in the middle of a rare party at their house, she is the first of the girls to successfully take her own life; the rest follow. With the haze of inexplicable death clouding every sequence, The Virgin Suicides reset the barometric pressure of teen movies. Who could or would protect these kids from themselves? Instead, Handy homes in on the biggest teen blockbusters of the 21st century— The Twilight Saga (2008–12) and The Hunger Games (2012–23)—two series, one fantasy and the other science fiction, in which teens succeed in summoning rare strength not just to manage their own hormones but to deal with their elders' destructive drives. The themes are familiar: sexual initiation for Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) in Twilight and peer competition for Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) in The Hunger Games. But a vampire boyfriend for Bella and gladiatorial combat in a totalitarian dystopia for Katniss—and ultimate wind-in-the-hair domestic bliss for both—leave the current social realities of teen life behind. The pressures of a hyper-meritocratic, social-media-saturated world surface elsewhere, with girls again in the foreground. Handy mentions the hilariously incisive Booksmart (2019) only in passing, but its two super-stressed-out, overachieving Los Angeles seniors, Molly and Amy (Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever), embody a strain of contemporary, and contradictory, fears about teenagers: Have they been so intent on molding themselves into some optimized version of young adulthood that the only thing they're headed for is burnout or disappointment? If they just chill, though, what about their future productivity? On the last day of school, the two girls are busy resolving student-council-budget issues—only to be jolted into questioning their rule-following zeal. Together, they dare to let loose before it's too late. Booksmart delivers a giddy quest-for-a-party ride, while also feeling like a heady glimpse into a teen therapist's session notes. For poignant scrutiny of the digital revolution's repercussions for teens, Handy might have explored the sweetly rendered Eighth Grade (2018), which arms a fledgling adolescent with her own camera. Kayla (Elsie Fisher), a painfully shy and insecure 13-year-old, is glued to screens, a voyeur obsessively scrolling for glimpses of lives that seem intimidatingly alien and glamorous. At the same time, she's a vlogger, posting wishfully affirmative videos online. Set during the last week of the school year, the movie deftly captures a kid caught between the digital and real worlds, trapped in her own head and stranded on the margins of an inaccessible peer scene. Finally daring to show up at a pool party, she doesn't reach for beer or pot; she has a panic attack. I couldn't help comparing the scene of Kayla, in an all-wrong bright-green one-piece, anxiously descending into the pool, head down as if to make herself invisible, with a memorable moment in Fast Times: the sexually-savvy-beyond-her-years Linda (Phoebe Cates), clad in a fire-engine-red bikini, majestically emerging from the water, a symbol of an era freighted with such different fears. By now, in the TikTok-teen era (vlogging Kayla was a little ahead of her time), the feedback-loop premise of Handy's history shows signs of being under strain. Teens, once Hollywood's lucrative market, no longer flock to theaters. And the place where their adventures are playing out isn't as readily accessible as it once was, even to hyper-hovering adults. If teens are still showing up at parties, they're on their phones there; if they still venture out to whatever malls they can find, they're on their phones there. When they're at school, they're mostly on their phones there, too. And what they are consuming is content produced by other teens—stories and TikToks and straight-to-camera diatribes more real to them than any film written by adults and shot through their anxious, or nostalgic, lens. The cohort that took over mass culture more than half a century ago has now built a sprawling culture for itself, by itself. In 2025, the most potent media produced about teenagers will likely emerge on those pocket-size life changers, and most grown-ups will never get wind of what's on display. How's that for something to worry about?
