Licorice Pizza

Entertaining and well-made though Licorice Pizza is, Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest film feels more like a collection of deleted scenes from Boogie Nights or Inherent Vice than its own work.

An oddly meandering effort from a filmmaker with typically more on his mind, this ’70s-set lark gets serviceable performances from Alana Haim and Cooper Hoffman as odd couple business partners with a decade’s age difference that complicates any potential romance, but the presence of star power is sorely missing. 

It’s doled out in bursts via what essentially amount to cameos from Sean Penn, Tom Waits, and — most memorably — Bradley Cooper as Hollywood big shots, and such magnificent scenes as one of the tensest truck-driving sequences since Sorcerer keep the action compelling, despite minimal substance tying them together.

Packed with so much running that Greta Gerwig must have been a creative consultant, Licorice Pizza is anything but static and should serve as a launching pad for its rookie leads, but its breezy, hangout nature limits its impact to mere amusing distraction instead of another Anderson masterpiece.

Grade: B. Rated R. Now playing at Carolina Cinemark, the Fine Arts Theatre, and Regal Biltmore Grande

(Photo: Melinda Sue Gordon/MGM)