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Freshman Year review – mortifying mumblecore look at a student hookup

Cooper Raiff stars as an immature student awkwardly adjusting to college life – and the idea that love might not be easy to come by

Cooper Raiff is the 24-year-old actor, writer and director making his feature debut with this intimate microbudget feature in the mumblecore style; it was a prize winner at the 2020 online SXSW festival, which led to Jay Duplass shepherding this wider release. Alex (played by Raiff) is a first-year college student who is desperately shy and has a childhood soft toy in his room. (In the first scene, Alex imagines this creature speaking to him silently and derisively in subtitles, a gag and a style of comedy not developed in the rest of the film.) Alex also has a mortifying habit of bursting into tears when he telephones his mother and sister, whom he misses desperately.

One night at a party, Alex has a wonderful romantic connection with supercool Maggie (Dylan Gelula); they have sex and hang out all night, and poor Alex thinks that this could be a wonderful relationship. But the next day, Maggie is weird and distant around him (she has already told him that she broke up with her high-school boyfriend because of her many infidelities), and Alex has to consider the possibility that this is what hooking up is like. Maybe there is no emotional content – or maybe people in their freshman year just aren’t ready for it.

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from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3AWSufI
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