Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist by Lorene Scafaria

Nick and Norah's Ultimate Playlist by Lorene Scafaria
Coming-of-Age Comedy/Romance Teen Film
Mandate Pictures, 2008
90 minutes
Suitable for 13+

Readers Annotation: Two teenagers, Nick and Norah, meet by chance and spend all night to try and find their favorite band's secret show.

Plot Summary: Nick loves music and plays bass in an "all gay" band. He just got his heart broken by his girlfriend. Norah goes to the same high school and has never met Nick. But to show up his ex-girlfriend, whom she despises, she pretends to be his girlfriend for five minutes after Nick's band just got done playing. They both love the publicity shy band "Where's Fluffy?" and thought that they would arrive there. Norah's drunk friend is being cared for by Nick's band-mates, which gives Nick and Norah all night to look for their favorite band through a series of clues. While looking for the secret show, they go through a series of adventures, learning about each other, eventually liking each other, meeting Norah's friend with benefits, and even looking for Norah's drunk friend who got lost. When Nick's ex-girlfriend re-enters the picture, things get complicated. But Nick and Norah know that they were meant for each other from their adventures together.

Critical Evaluation: This film was constantly entertaining with music oozing out of it. The music is all right, it's an emo type of music geared towards teens and the fashions throughout have an indie feel to it. The film is structured to where the adventures take up the majority of the film and that's what counts because that's what brings closeness and exposition to Nick and Norah. Both characters are well-developed, and have an odd couple mismatch that creates conflict and entertains the viewer. The title is well deserved since a mix tape is what brought them two together by accident. Norah's drunk friend is quite annoying with her cliche, blond remarks, but she is sort of the straw that stirs the drink; without her the story would have a different feel. At least she's not the main character. One gets the feeling that this is hip with a touch of cute warmness; the perfect date movie.

Author: Lorene was born in Holmdel, New Jersey. While younger, she would write fake book reports to win Pizza Hut gift certificates and thus showed an interest in writing. By 17, she produced her first play. She attended Montclair State University.

Lorene Scafaria is a playright, screenwriter, actress, and singer. She is best known for writing the screenplay of Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, which was based on the book with the same title, written by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan. Lorene has written nine screenplays such as Iraqi war docudrama Sweet Relief and Man and Wife. She has also written a song on Drew Berrymore's Whip It!

Booktalking Ideas:
1) Music
2) Bands
3) Relationships
4) Friends with benefits
5) Drinking
6) Coming-of-age

Challenge Issues: There are no challenge issues present in this film.

Why Included: I couldn't think of another teen film that I've seen that had a PG-13 rating. I enjoyed this film even though I thought the music was a bit lame.