Hot Summer Nights (2017)

Small town local young heartthrob Cannabis seller teams up w/nerdy reject to expand his business. Nerd ends up over his head while also chasing the local female femme fatale. Acting was good; backdrop tunes were OK for the '90s setup. Problems: A lot of wasted time on scenes that didn't contribute, i.e. overhead shots of a beach as well as a hurricane, and the sense of it being a hot Summer, none played a role in the story. In fact the hurricane, Bob, technically was a bust for a hurricane. A lot of the important character background was written & edited poorly, just sporadic bits here & there which made the story flow disruptive & confusing. Drug scenes, and party scenes were all pretty predictable. Major problem: The ending for all major characters went no where, and the death which occurs towards the end, could have been prevented knowing it's coming, and they have a gun. Didn't make any sense.

Fmovies: The main issue I have is the lack of focus on the time period. The clothes felt 80s. The music 70s, sometimes early 80s, and worse Scorsese 50/60s music. But it actually took place in the 90s. It's a real problem when you have people making films from a period they weren't part of.

Too many character

There was too much forced weirdness, but realistic stuff. Plus it was too slow moving. The whole premise just felt derivative. Cliche scenes and characters, and way too many characters.

Then we had the phony kisses, and the blatant rip off of Goodfellas. Too many "director moments" slow motion shots etc to hammer a point. Don't need that. After an hour I just wanted it to end. The scenes are starting to repeat themselves.. Relentless, like on a loop without any point. Too many side stories without any need to.

And do you really expect an audience to believe that no one from the "small town" told the brother that Danny was hanging with his sister? These people must be really stupid. It was so implausible and unbelievable.

Danny actually wears a Jesse Jackson 88 cap? That was hilarious.

I was lucky enough to catch this film at SXSW this year, and was blown away by every aspect of it. It's perhaps one of the most stylish and confident directorial debuts I've ever seen- director Elijah Bynum and his collaborators are firing on all cylinders here with beautiful cinematography, a knockout script that isn't afraid to slow down for thoughtful, character-driven moments, and stellar acting across the board.

Timothee Chalamet is the obvious standout here, and his transition from innocence to intimidating criminality is believable and chilling. Bynum has a sense for the cinematic "moment"- two characters sharing a lollipop in a convenience store in an extreme close-up, for example- that brings to mind the works of some of cinema's greatest directors. In conjunction with all this is a dynamite soundtrack and a unique sense of style that I look forward to seeing more of in Bynum's future work.

Hot Summer Nights fmovies. It's hard to describe or categorize.. but maybe something like if you mixed together an offbeat coming of age tale, teenage crime drama and a love story.. set it in the early 90s and gave it a sublime soundtrack! It's intense and oozes style, seriously it's great go see it!

This film should have everything going for it. A coming of age film featuring two of the hottest young leads of today. An 80's feel and vibe that should have made it a hit with people who like to feel that wave. It should really have been a film that I could enjoy. Unfortunately, I felt like Hot Summer Nights just got weaker as time went on and falls into genre cliches and fails to impress all around. Side note, Maika Monroe has my heart, good lord.

The film is about a kid in cape cod who links up with a rather aggressive friend who then decide to sell drugs and make good bank of off it. Along the way the lead Daniel Middleton, (Timothee Chalamet) falls in love with his partners sister (Maika Monroe). This causes waves as any type of relationship with her is strictly forbidden in her brothers eyes. Daniel has to balance his relationship and also deal with the dangers that arise in the risky business he finds himself in.

The film is well acted all around. Chalamet is obviously one of the top young actors going around. Maike Monroe is a nice talent that is emerging in these niche type creative horror films (she's also absolutely smokin' in this film as well). The two leads interaction and relationship is nice to watch but its ruined by a film that is high on nostalgic cliches and a typically 80's soundtrack and mood that feels meshed in in a not so subtle manner. There's just no creativity with this effort, it becomes a "been there seen that" type coming of age film that gets even more unimpressive as it goes along.

I was actually really looking forward to this film because it just had the marketing, vibe, and cast that should have made this film one of the best of the summer. Unfortunately, it fails to stir up any good feelings, isn't paced well, and fades away without a second thought. I mean just look at that film poster, how do you fail that? The film truly exemplifies the worst parts of hot summer nights; sticky and gross.

6/10

This coming-to-age film starring some pretty decent talent with the likes of Maika Monroe and Thomas Jane, is about a boy who becomes entangled in a world of drugs, money, and corruption during one summer in Cape Cod, now going into this movie I saw nothing but the one trailer that was released of my knowledge, and was pretty much stoked. I'm a big fan of these underground goodies not enough people talk about, also the sheer fact you had the likes of Maika (It follows), which was reason enough to get me to watch it because that was a great film, and i was throughly surprised not only with the films setting, and plot. This film has great cinematography and a all around 80's feel to it from the clothes that these kids wear all the way to the drive in movie theater. And performance from all the cast is quite well from a Timothy who did well playing a shy, awkward kid. To Thomas Jane's Odd Cop role. It's a movie that I'll reconsider watching again, maybe even owning on blu Ray. Because the rewatchability is there