'Mile End Kicks' stops hearing the music
HANDOUT
No matter what you think of “Almost Famous” or “High Fidelity” — does anyone not like either? Show yourselves! — you’d be in hot take territory to claim those movies don’t care a lot a lot about their bands and songs and both address the art while memorably considering the lives of the listeners.
“Mile End Kicks,” however, does neither.
Its premise, built on budding music critic Grace’s (Barbie Ferreira of “Euphoria”) adventure in Montreal while planning to write a 33 1/3 on Alanis Morrissette’s “Jagged Little Pill” (and then for much of the time not writing it), is mostly a bait and switch. In its place, sadly, is a dull love triangle featuring Grace (who has an “Almost Famous” poster on her bedroom wall at her parents’ house and should probably watch “Singles”), clearly bad news singer Chevy (Stanley Simons) and the band’s sensitive guitarist Archie (Devon Bostick) who is sweet and straight from nice-guy central casting. What is meant to be discovered in this trio beyond a 20-something’s transparently poor romantic judgment?
That alone would be a disappointing dead end, and it’s made worse by writer-director Chandler Levack (the far superior “I Like Movies”) abandoning what initially seems like a great hook: Grace wants to write about “Jagged Little Pill” because of her personal connection to its release of anger, and the 2011-set “Mile End Kicks” might’ve had juice as a coming-of-age story informed by music and the impact it has on the fan. But, as with “I Like Movies,” Levack loses grip on why people like what they like and fails to maintain Grace’s professional credibility (what in the world is a music critic/publicist? No) or even affinity for the art. If anything, the very predictable shenanigans she falls into with Chevy should inspire her writing, and plenty of layered productivity and understanding could ensue.
But Levack instead just wants to explore Grace’s inexperience and procrastination, fumbling for even a fraction of the transformative aimlessness of “Adventureland” while neglecting an exploration of the sonic identity of the exploding Montreal music scene.
“Bob Trevino Likes It,” which featured an even better star turn from Ferreira, told a moving story about learning to let it out. “Mile End Kicks” has a few moments that are a kick for anyone who was in that journalistic world at the time (raises hand while understanding the elements of this that are personal to Levack, a former critic, and female critics in particular). But it’s also a rom-com without jokes or wisdom or the guts to lean into the thing it claims to value above all, with an ending that even further undermines its empowerment thesis.
At least it explains why Levack didn’t call this one “I Like Music”; for too long, that point gets turned so far down as to be inaudible.
C
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