• Home
  • Longform
    • Defanging the Unthinkable
      more
      View more

      Defanging the Unthinkable

      6 years ago
    • A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye
      more
      View more

      A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye

      6 years ago
    • The Ambivalent, Bittersweet "My Life as a Zucchini"
      more
      View more

      The Ambivalent, Bittersweet "My Life as a Zucchini"

      6 years ago
    • The Complex Morality of "No Country for Old Men"
      more
      View more

      The Complex Morality of "No Country for Old Men"

      6 years ago
  • Interviews
    • A New Way of Telling Love Stories
      more
      View more

      A New Way of Telling Love Stories

      6 years ago
    • Breaking Standards with Julian Rosefeldt of "Manifesto"
      more
      View more

      Breaking Standards with Julian Rosefeldt of "Manifesto"

      6 years ago
    • Indulging Mightily with Alex Ross Perry and the "Golden Exits" Cast
      more
      View more

      Indulging Mightily with Alex Ross Perry and the "Golden Exits" Cast

      6 years ago
    • The Ultimate Meta-Performance: Kate Lyn Sheil on "Kate Plays Christine"
      more
      View more

      The Ultimate Meta-Performance: Kate Lyn Sheil on "Kate Plays Christine"

      7 years ago
  • Critic-At-Large
    • Now Playing: "From Nowhere"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "From Nowhere"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "Fifty Shades Darker"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "Fifty Shades Darker"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "War on Everyone"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "War on Everyone"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "The Salesman"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "The Salesman"

      6 years ago
  • Podcast
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 287: "Kundun"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 287: "Kundun"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 286: "Pinocchio"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 286: "Pinocchio"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 285: "That Darn Cat"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 285: "That Darn Cat"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 284: "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 284: "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement"

      6 years ago
Movie Mezzanine
  • Home
  • Longform
    • Defanging the Unthinkable
      more
      View more

      Defanging the Unthinkable

      6 years ago
    • A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye
      more
      View more

      A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye

      6 years ago
    • The Ambivalent, Bittersweet "My Life as a Zucchini"
      more
      View more

      The Ambivalent, Bittersweet "My Life as a Zucchini"

      6 years ago
    • The Complex Morality of "No Country for Old Men"
      more
      View more

      The Complex Morality of "No Country for Old Men"

      6 years ago
  • Interviews
    • A New Way of Telling Love Stories
      more
      View more

      A New Way of Telling Love Stories

      6 years ago
    • Breaking Standards with Julian Rosefeldt of "Manifesto"
      more
      View more

      Breaking Standards with Julian Rosefeldt of "Manifesto"

      6 years ago
    • Indulging Mightily with Alex Ross Perry and the "Golden Exits" Cast
      more
      View more

      Indulging Mightily with Alex Ross Perry and the "Golden Exits" Cast

      6 years ago
    • The Ultimate Meta-Performance: Kate Lyn Sheil on "Kate Plays Christine"
      more
      View more

      The Ultimate Meta-Performance: Kate Lyn Sheil on "Kate Plays Christine"

      7 years ago
  • Critic-At-Large
    • Now Playing: "From Nowhere"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "From Nowhere"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "Fifty Shades Darker"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "Fifty Shades Darker"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "War on Everyone"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "War on Everyone"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "The Salesman"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "The Salesman"

      6 years ago
  • Podcast
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 287: "Kundun"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 287: "Kundun"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 286: "Pinocchio"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 286: "Pinocchio"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 285: "That Darn Cat"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 285: "That Darn Cat"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 284: "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 284: "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement"

      6 years ago
  • Home
  • Longform
    • Defanging the Unthinkable
      more
      View more

      Defanging the Unthinkable

      6 years ago
    • A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye
      more
      View more

      A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye

      6 years ago
    • The Ambivalent, Bittersweet "My Life as a Zucchini"
      more
      View more

      The Ambivalent, Bittersweet "My Life as a Zucchini"

      6 years ago
    • The Complex Morality of "No Country for Old Men"
      more
      View more

      The Complex Morality of "No Country for Old Men"

      6 years ago
  • Interviews
    • A New Way of Telling Love Stories
      more
      View more

      A New Way of Telling Love Stories

      6 years ago
    • Breaking Standards with Julian Rosefeldt of "Manifesto"
      more
      View more

      Breaking Standards with Julian Rosefeldt of "Manifesto"

      6 years ago
    • Indulging Mightily with Alex Ross Perry and the "Golden Exits" Cast
      more
      View more

      Indulging Mightily with Alex Ross Perry and the "Golden Exits" Cast

      6 years ago
    • The Ultimate Meta-Performance: Kate Lyn Sheil on "Kate Plays Christine"
      more
      View more

      The Ultimate Meta-Performance: Kate Lyn Sheil on "Kate Plays Christine"

      7 years ago
  • Critic-At-Large
    • Now Playing: "From Nowhere"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "From Nowhere"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "Fifty Shades Darker"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "Fifty Shades Darker"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "War on Everyone"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "War on Everyone"

      6 years ago
    • Now Playing: "The Salesman"
      more
      View more

      Now Playing: "The Salesman"

      6 years ago
  • Podcast
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 287: "Kundun"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 287: "Kundun"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 286: "Pinocchio"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 286: "Pinocchio"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 285: "That Darn Cat"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 285: "That Darn Cat"

      6 years ago
    • Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 284: "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement"
      more
      View more

      Mousterpiece Cinema, Episode 284: "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement"

      6 years ago
This Week on Mubi: “L for Leisure”
  • Featured / Longform

This Week on Mubi: “L for Leisure”

  • by Jake Cole
  • December 11, 2015
  • 0
  • 2803

Editor’s note: We are thrilled to announce that MUBI, the curated online cinema that brings its members a hand-picked selection of the best independent, international, and classic films, is  sponsoring Movie Mezzanine. You can use the discount on this promo page to check out all of MUBI’s selections. 

Though American independent cinema has never been more stylistically or creatively diverse, the term “indie” can immediately conjure a hyper-specific image of twee characterization, overwhelmingly white casts, and self-conscious dialogue. So ingrained is that image that as many parodies of the style have proliferated as straight takes, to the point that they can rarely be separated from what they spoof. But there’s never been a movie quite like L for Leisure, which follows a loose vignette structure while vaguely resembling “Miami Vice” episodes as shot by a prepubescent Whit Stillman.

Stylistically, the full-frame, low-quality film format could pass for a sedate project from Harmony Korine, albeit one that swaps out freaks for geeks. Tracking and splintering off with various gaggles of graduate students on break, L for Leisure unites its disappearing and reappearing characters through their camaraderie as put-out TAs and their awkward inability to have conversations outside of academic stiffness. These young adults definitely fit the part of grad students: hairlines gird themselves for coming erosion, skin looks distinctively unexposed to prolonged sunlight, and everyone wears ruffled clothes that may once have seemed fashionable but are now the only things left in closets that have not disintegrated from frequent wear. People at a lake house sit around in mismatched swimwear as if they want desperately to look normal but haven’t the faintest idea how to do so, adrift without some thesis to argue.

Everyone speaks as if they learned English from a combination of ironic t-shirts and semiotic theory. Offering someone a drink, one boy asks “Want some of my Snapple?” in a tone that suggests he’s in a commercial only he knows about; elsewhere, Sierra (Marianna McClellan), a woman studying post-apocalyptic literature, casually defends her choice of subject as a fantasy of our banal present and an inspiration for politicians’ doomsday rhetoric. The dialogue is endlessly quotable, with everyone’s staccato, distanced delivery—never a conversation so much as a linked series of pronouncements—perfectly separating out lines like “What’s the Kronos Quartet?” or “I’ll be Swatching you” for context-free use.

It’s important, though, to remember that despite their eerily formal dialogue, these characters are a bunch of kids, and much of their mental faculties are devoted to the scatalogical and Dionysian, as in talk among some girls about soaking tampons in vodka as a means to get drunk without drinking. The esoteric knowledge on display also does not preclude great ignorance of more important matters, consistently presented in visual and spoken juxtapositions between social ills and the students’ ignorance, whether it’s flyers for an “AIDS dance” strewn around a tennis court where some work out or a discussion of the Rodney King riots that is abstracted to the point that some (white) students look forward to it while others interrupt to offer ice cream.

The insularity of these people is stressed at every point, up to and especially the fact that the film was shot on actual film. The soundtrack, by John Atkinson, is an amalgam of contemporary chillwave and throwback Tangerine Dream clusters, a half-sinister, half-wacky approach that compounds the idiosyncrasy of the movie, and how even this thorough parody of indie tropes can nonetheless be so distinct from its peers. It’s hard to expect much from a film whose first on-screen credit is for the production company “Ball Deep Int’l,” but L for Leisure is one of the highlights of a general boon period for indies. As much time as the film devotes to mocking grad students for their absurdly obscure fields of study, though, there is also a heart under all this affectation, one attuned to the difficulty, even among people with advanced vocabularies, to articulate desires. Self-awareness and obliviousness occupy the same ungainly space, epitomized when one boy displaces his nervousness with a girl by saying, ”I’m always down for a strong make-out sesh, but sex is something I hold onto,” and she responds “I admire that” while slapping his knee with forced chumminess. It’s a moment of excruciatingly awkward comedy, yet it’s slightly tragic, a moment of two people recognizing each other’s weaknesses as their own and parting uncertainly before they share even more.

If you’re interesting in watching L for Leisure on MUBI, use your Movie Mezzanine coupon for an exclusive discount and access to a breathtaking library of cinema!

Tags
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

Related posts

  • NathanaelHood
80
Defanging the Unthinkable

Defanging the Unthinkable

6 years ago
  • AndyHoglund
81
A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye

A Fitting, Impressive Goodbye

6 years ago
  • MichaelSicinski
91
The Ambivalent, Bittersweet “My Life as a Zucchini”

The Ambivalent, Bittersweet “My Life as a Zucchini”

6 years ago

Comments are closed.

About Us

Movie Mezzanine is an online publication dedicated to covering the medium that connects us all, one film at a time. With writers stationed around the globe, we offer a uniquely diverse perspective on cinema, both old and new. To learn more about us, go here.

Spotlight

Putting the Geek to the Plow

Cleantalk Pixel