Quartile rating: 6.5/10 · 1 rating
A lack of parental guidance encourages teens in an affluent California town to rebel with substance abuse and casual sex.
Palo Alto is visually striking, with Gia Coppola bringing a dreamy, washed-out California aesthetic that elevates the material above its modest story. The cinematography is genuinely evocative — languid, sun-drenched, and atmospheric in a way that feels distinctive. The acting is competent to good, with Emma Roberts and Jack Kilmer delivering understated, naturalistic performances. However, the plot is episodic and meandering, offering little narrative momentum — it's a collection of vignettes about bored teens that rarely coalesces into something urgent or illuminating. The ending similarly dissipates rather than resolves, leaving little emotional payoff. Novelty sits in the middle: while it has a recognizable indie-teen-ennui template, Coppola's specific voice and visual grammar give it enough of its own identity to avoid feeling purely formulaic.