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It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

(For the most part.)Here are some things to know about this movie:Gia Coppola (Francis Ford Coppola's granddaughter) directed, her first outing. She also wrote the screenplay based on James Franco's short story collection also entitled "Palo Alto." She was 25-years- old at the time.Emma Roberts who plays April and was 22-years-old when this film was released in 2013 is Julia Roberts' niece. Her father is Eric Roberts (467 credits as an actor).Palo Alto, California is an upscale Silicon Valley community and home to Stanford University.Franco, who plays soccer coach Mr. B, is from Palo Alto. He has a degree in English with a concentration in creative writing from UCLA.There are no helicoptering parents in this movie.Initially I had a lot of trouble watching this because of all the unnecessary cigarette smoking apparently as product placements. It's sad that some producers can't get funding without taking big tobacco's money. However, I'll give that a pass since some of the smoking had relevance to the story—or "stories." The viewer can see that Coppola cleverly weaved parts of Franco's various stories and characters into a mostly coherent whole that plays as a larger story.The other problem for me was the intensity and raw teenage emotional abandonment depicted. This is life lived in the fast lane when you're still living at home and have an incredible need for experiences, sometimes regardless of the consequences.--Dennis Littrell, author of the movie review collection, "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote"

Palo Alto follows two teenagers specifically as they live their lives at the end of their high school years, as they and their friends develop relationships and attempt to balance their stress with everything else. Gia Coppola does a great job with the directing here. There were several scenes that proved pretty to look at or just plain flattering for the actors or sets. It was nice to see someone putting effort into the movie. As far as acting goes, Emma Roberts shows herself to be a talented actress that simply hasn't found the role to make her one of the greats. There's an Oscar winner in there somewhere, she just hasn't found her yet. Jack Kilmer most notably pulls off a solid performance as the other leading teenager. He pulls off the whole stoner persona really well, while still bringing depth to his character. And James Franco also manages to pull off a note-worthy performance here as a high school soccer coach. He's genuine, no matter what the material is that he's given. As for the rest of the acting, it ranges from bad to okay. The main child actor is pretty terrible. Every line he's given is just an atrocious read and it's so blatant that this kid has no idea what he's doing, nor any concept of how to act. I know he's a kid, and thankfully his role was small, but I don't really care. He sucked. There was also this voice over of a judge reading something to one of the characters and he's just monotone for the entire thing. Nobody talks like that. It's like he was literally reading off the script. Nat Wolff was kind of off and on here. Sometimes he was pretty good, and other times he wasn't so much. Some of the writing was good. It resonated with me and I was able to relate to some of the feelings of the characters. But a lot of the time it was way out there. Coppola didn't seem to know how to make these characters hook up romantically, because a lot of the time they just start making out and hope for the best. And it works a lot of the time. Like apparently there's no such thing as relationship made organically, people just mack and pray. Some of the characters are kind of dumb sometimes. They jump to conclusions and overreact. Furthermore, the movie attempts to cram as much relatable high school junk in as possible, and as a result none of it receives nearly as much development as it should. There's the whole soccer thing, then there's graduation and relationships and partying and volunteering (no working apparently) and as a result multiple of these things take a backseat to each other. And while some of them did receive plenty of attention, many didn't. Also there's this metaphor for life that gets briefly mentioned at some point in the movie and then gets brought up again at the end as if it's a huge deal and has huge significance to the entire movie and all that, when in actuality the metaphor is poorly presented and doesn't make a whole lot of sense with the rest of the movie. It's pretty pretentious. And the pacing is just flat out bad. When the movie seemed to be wrapping up it'd only hit halfway, and from then on I was losing interest with every minute. And it doesn't help that the movie is super repetitive. It's a lot of the same scenarios with the same characters dealing with the same stuff. It gets pretty boring after a while. Overall Palo Alto kind of sucks. I like the concept of taking two very different teenagers and showing their story from their perspective and how they interact with each other and all that, but a concept alone isn't enough to save an entire film. It's often poorly written, poorly acted, and boring. Sure the directing and some performances are saving graces, but they simply can't support the entire film. In the end I wouldn't recommend it.

It's been a long time since I watched movies and I have to say that this kind of movies has reminded me of the reason why I watch movies. The difference between books and movies is that books are so much easier; the reader could imagine and project anything they want from their own experiences onto the books. Movies, on the contrary, are often frowned upon because the screenplay is the director's vision, thus, there is much less left for fantasy for those dreamers who want to enjoy the movie in their own way. As a person getting out of high school, I fully relate to this. Even though I live in a remote part of Asia and could not experience such wild events as in the movies, somehow, I could understand the message. Despite a great many of their unreasonable actions that would seem unintelligible to older generations including self-destructive behaviors done out of self-hate, insecurities, they crave love and want to contribute something meaningful to their own life. Judging from their own circumstances, it was understandable that they were under too many pressures, both from within and without; hence, they couldn't realize what was wrong and what was right. By putting themselves out there, facing their problems, these youngsters have been courageously transforming every aspect of their life and as a result, become a better person. The process may take a long time and may not promise an easy route but I believe that with determination, these kids will succeed. Gia Coppola have done an amazing job in depicting what is happening with the young nowadays, striving to live in a world full of turmoil and struggling to find a purpose of their life.

There are movies that are so bad, they're good, and then there are movies that are just bad, with no saving grace--example: Palo Alto.This movie follows the lives of several teenagers, with little commentary on the how and why of each event. The two leads--Roberts and Franco--are highlighted, and are the most interesting characters-- the only problem, the story is a complete misinterpretation and misrepresentation of ephebephilia. It is a shame, because the trailer led you to believe thats what the movie was about--and it had very little to do with it all.The basic idea of the love interest between Franco and Roberts is that Franco, aka Mr. B the soccer coach, pursues April, an underage girl on his team. The film suggested that Mr. B used his power to manipulate April, and furthermore, it is revealed that using girls as his babysitter is his routine, that he is a predator intentionally to all underage girls, or at least multiple. In other words, the movie suggests that pedophiles are not only child predators, but they engage in polygamy and are sick and twisted in all sexual matters, not just underage girls. This is horribly false. Apart from this, there is no further plot line involving Mr. B, such as court cases or parental conflicts, and Roberts' parent(s) are nowhere to be found in the movie at all. In other words, child predators are apparently sneaky and dangerous intentionally. Again, not usually true.First, let's clarify something. There are 4 types of pedofilia: Infantaphilia, pedophilia, hebephilia, and ephebephilia. Infant- Infatns, pedo-kids (like a pediatrician), hebephilia-pubescent but not fully developed (generally 11-14), and ephebephilia (developed teens, generally 15-19). Mr. B/Franco would fall under the ephebephilia. Does Palo Alto ever discuss any of these, or even use these terms? Not once. Second, ephebephiles especially fall into the next topic: they typically aren't going around from teen to teen. While they may be "attracted" to multiple teens, they usually don't go around on a mass pedophile spree. We often think statutory rape is like every other rape, when it really isn't. Statutory rape can exist even if both parties consent, and the older is the guilty party. Is ephebephilia wrong? Well, at least in the U.S. for 15-17, because it is illegal. In most other countries, generally under 16 is illegal. The movies makes zero mention of this factor. Third: Mr. B, at least in the film, received no punishment whatsoever. Furthermore, there is no evidence that April battled the thought of turning him in. It is true that underage victims might fear revealing the circumstances, but no such thing was shown. It was just as if this was normal everyday behavior. It's normal to experience the attraction, not so normal to not experience emotion following it.Fourth: The movie suggests Mr. B intentionally exploited April's emotions. Again, not always true. In fact, rarely true. More often than not, it is actually the female who pursues the man, putting the responsibility on the man to show restraint, and not place himself in bad circumstances--such as giving a girl a ride home, or being alone with a student, or inviting your own pupil to babysit in an unmarried home. This is actually the main reason why there are so many cases--there are many preventive programs for the teens, telling them not to do it, which in some cases has the reverse effect, while there is no program for adults on how to avoid those circumstances, so they wind up giving in to temptation, as most men are attracted to fertile female bodies--that is evolution.Am I suggesting any type of pedophilia is OK? Well, some ephebephilia is legal/OK: 18-19, and in other countries as low as 16. It's really relative to the country. It is only not OK here because of the law, but we are one of the highest age of majority's in the world.The movie isn't bad because it's about ephebephilia, it's bad because it advertises that it is and then has zero discussion on it, and completely misrepresents it.