The Low Down

Covers this exact same territory, but does it with such refreshing, clearheaded honesty and skill it seems like a revelation.

Lightweight but likable and blessedly free of the posing and pretensions that mark the Hollywood crop of twentysomething coming-of-age films.

This kind of filmmaking is riddled with so-called errors, but these mistakes are indistinguishable from the uncommon rewards.

Captures the ensemble quality it was after and the provisional look and feel are perfect stylistic analogues to the lives - the male lives, anyway - that it's portraying.

Almost nothing happens for most of the movie.

If the movie sometimes seems not to come to much either, it does have something to say to those patient enough to stick with it.

The whole thing is shot in an irritating, self-conscious way.