Based on Jon Savage’s 2007 book Teenage: The Creation of Youth Culture, Matt Wolf’s elliptical and handsome documentary Teenage delves into the history of teen-hood, revealing how those formative years between 12 and 20 produced generations that were cultural forces to be reckoned with in the West during the 20th century’s earliest decades. Using a collage style that includes archival footage, newsreels, dramatic reenactments (anchored by recognizable young actors such as Jenna Malone and total newcomers found by street-casting impresario Eleonore Hendricks), the movie takes us to pre-war Germany, through the pages of diaries of midwestern 15-year-olds, and to dance […]
by Brandon Harris on Mar 16, 2014Cinereach, the not-for-profit film support and production company, is offering moviegoers who see at least two of the four Cinereach-supported pictures in theaters this month special, one-of-a-kind artist gifts. The films — all of which are very good, by the way — are Matt Wolf’s Teenage, Tom Gilroy’s The Cold Lands, Eliza Hittman’s It Felt Like Love and Daniel Carbone’s Hide Your Smiling Faces. (The first two are at the IFC Center in New York now; It Felt Like Love opens next week and Hide Your Smiling Faces on the 28th). Here is info from Cinereach: Why? Indie releases unite! […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 14, 2014Youth culture didn’t start in the ’60s. In the parlance of today’s teens, the appropriate response to this might be “duh.” Teenage, director Matt Wolf’s artful new non-fiction film, uncovers the “hidden history” of youth culture and locates its origins in various youth movements in the first half of the 20th century. From German Swing kids to American Victory Girls, the film offers a veritable lexicon of lost teen vocabulary (“teen canteen,” “buzz bucket,” “boogie in the strut hut”), and reminds us that the invention of teenager culture depended on the invention of a new language — and one that […]
by Paul Dallas on Apr 25, 2013Matt Wolf, one of our 25 New Faces of 2008, and author and critic Jon Savage are collaborating on a feature doc, Teenage, based on Savage’s 2007 book, Teenage: The Creation of Youth Culture. Although it may seem that being a teenager is an ahistorical fact of life, Savage’s book detailed the cultural creation of the teenage class, tracing its relationship to art, political movements, and the rise of consumer culture. Their feature will bring this all to life with, as their new teaser trailer exhibits, archival footage, an evocative voiceover by Jena Malone, and music by Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox. […]
by Scott Macaulay on Mar 21, 2011