Make the Case: The Unparalleled, Nuanced Writing at the Heart of ‘Licorice Pizza’

“Whatever you do, do it carefully,” Alma warns Reynolds Woodcock in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread. Throughout the film, the young woman proves herself to be more confident, more self-assured, and more dangerous than she’d let on in that hotel restaurant where she and the older fashion designer first met. She ends up shaping the narrative of their love story, to the point that she’s the one telling it to the audience while Reynolds is yet again sick in bed. She tames him, and creates a cyclical, almost predictable structure for their life together.

The love story in Licorice Pizza is the antidote to Phantom Thread and its toxic yet expertly concocted romance.