12 Greatest Motion pictures Like 2003’s 13

The 2003 indie drama “13” was extensively acclaimed upon launch whereas elevating the careers of filmmaker Catherine Hardwicke (who was paid simply $13 for the job) and actors Evan Rachel Wooden and Nikki Reed. “13” was lauded for its searing, up to date depiction of the lives of impressionable American youngsters. For these on the lookout for films tackling related subject material and themes, there isn’t a scarcity of teenybopper coming-of-age dramas. From triumphs to tragedies, loads of films have explored the on a regular basis lifetime of American youngsters, each previous “13” and launched within the 2003 movie’s wake.

From dramedies to tonally uncompromising dramas, these pivotal teenage years are ripe for cinematic exploration. Even the comedies on this coming-of-age listing do not shrink back from the heavier components of the teenage expertise, together with unlawful drug use, psychological well being considerations, and teenage being pregnant. Merely put, rising up is usually a grueling ordeal, and these films discover the heartbreak and humor in lower than excellent coming-of-age eventualities. Listed here are the 12 greatest films like Catherine Hardwicke’s 2013 movie “13.”

Filmmaker Sofia Coppola got here out the gate swinging along with her 1999 function directorial debut “The Virgin Suicides.” True to its title, the film is a darkish portrait of a gaggle of sisters headed by overprotective mother and father withdrawn from the remainder of the neighborhood. In the course of the summer time of 1975, the household’s youngest daughter, Celicia (Hanna R. Corridor), kills herself, making her mother and father much more restrictive of their surviving daughters. This results in the ladies reacting in their very own rebellious methods, significantly the household’s oldest daughter, Lux (Kirsten Dunst).

Unfolding like a contemporary fairytale, there’s a sense of surrealism that permeates all through “The Virgin Suicides” and its cautionary story of overbearing mother and father. That dream-like high quality progressively turns right into a lurid nightmare because the story grows extra foreboding and sinister. Coppola hews faithfully to 1993 novel supply materials by Jeffrey Eugenides, whereas giving the story a extra ethereal really feel. Coppola went on to have her personal intensive directorial profession although with nothing close to as darkish as “The Virgin Suicides” to this point.

The identical yr that Natalie Portman made her “Star Wars” debut as Queen Amidala, she additionally starred within the 1999 dramedy “Wherever however Right here.” Portman performs Ann, a young person who relocates from small-town Wisconsin to Los Angeles along with her mom Adele (Susan Sarandon). As Adele struggles to make ends meet, she hopes that Ann will efficiently land a job as an actor. Nevertheless, Ann is extra keen on making buddies within the new city and attending Brown College as an alternative, placing the mom and daughter at odds.

What carries and elevates “Wherever however Right here” from being one other throwaway drama are Sarandon and Portman’s performances. Portman, specifically, offers a extra understated and insightful efficiency as Ann, a younger lady a lot wiser and restrained than her mom. On the similar time, Ann is a personality who has her personal reckless hopes and goals, however approaches them a lot otherwise than Adele. A showcase for its leads, “Wherever however Right here” promised sturdy issues from Portman, a promise she has constantly delivered upon.

Winona Ryder had began her on-screen profession with numerous coming-of-age roles within the late ’80s and early ’90s. Years later, she took on a a lot darker and mature coming-of-age function for 1999’s “Woman, Interrupted.” Primarily based on the memoir of Susanna Kaysen, Ryder performs Kaysen, who’s admitted to a New England psychiatric hospital towards her will in 1967 after enduring a nervous breakdown. As Kaysen receives therapy, she meets Lisa Rowe (Angelina Jolie), a sociopathic affected person with a penchant for escaping confinement and stirring up hassle.

High-to-bottom, “Woman, Interrupted” has a stacked ensemble solid, with Ryder and Jolie joined by Clea Duvall, Elisabeth Moss, Vanessa Redgrave, and extra. Whereas Ryder greater than holds her personal as Kaysen, Jolie is completely magnetic in her efficiency as Rowe. Every time Jolie is on-screen, she’s a drive of nature, intensely unpredictable and commanding all the eye in her scenes. Jolie would earn a well-deserved Academy Award for her work within the movie whereas “Woman, Interrupted” ended Ryder’s run of coming-of-age roles on a strong and cathartic notice.

Primarily based on the ’90s comedian e book of the identical identify by Daniel Clowes, 2001’s “Ghost World” focuses on that final gasp earlier than bonafide maturity, the summer time after highschool commencement. Greatest buddies Enid (Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson) face no severe future prospects as they seek for jobs and a spot to dwell. Whereas attending a remedial artwork class to earn her diploma, Enid befriends Seymour (Steve Buscemi), a lonely middle-aged man on the lookout for companionship. Enid’s budding relationship with Seymour strains her dynamic with Rebecca as the 2 younger girls progressively develop aside.

Utterly angst-ridden in its pondering tour of younger grownup alienation, “Ghost World” is as restrained and understated as its protagonist. Birch offers a career-best efficiency as Enid, a tragic determine, drifting in direction of life’s subsequent essential crossroads. Equally, Buscemi is exact and delicate in his dealing with of Seymour, a personality who may simply be a creep reworked right into a sympathetic misfit. Lovely in its depiction of social malaise, “Ghost World” is an ignored masterful comedian e book adaptation, and it is one among Scarlett Johansson’s greatest films too.

Kirsten Dunst and Jay Hernandez play a highschool couple from reverse sides of the monitor in 2001’s “Loopy/Lovely.” Hernandez performs Carlos, a young person from East Los Angeles who travels to a highschool within the Pacific Palisades to satisfy his dream of attending the U.S. Naval Academy. Carlos begins relationship Nicole (Dunst), a classmate and the rebellious daughter of a neighborhood congressman. Because the couple grows extra severe, their completely different backgrounds put a pressure on their relationship, with each units of oldsters feeling they’re a nasty match for one another.

Although “Loopy/Lovely” won’t have probably the most unique story, the lead performances from Hernandez and Dunst gentle up what may’ve been formulaic materials. Dunst and Hernandez have a pure chemistry, with each giving earnest performances as their characters give into younger love with reckless abandon. Dunst, specifically, shines as Nicole, whose hard-partying methods conceal a broken and weak coronary heart. “Loopy/Lovely” does not reinvent the coming-of-age wheel but additionally does not attempt to, as an alternative specializing in crafting a strong L.A. love story.

Although the subject of teenybopper being pregnant won’t seem to be a supply of comedy, 2007’s “Juno” manages to seek out laughs in its mature subject material. Minnesota excessive schooler Juno MacGuff (Elliot Web page) turns into pregnant after sleeping along with her good friend Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera). Deciding to surrender the incoming child for adoption, Juno meets with the potential adoptive mother and father Vanessa Loring (Jennifer Garner) and her husband Mark (Jason Bateman). As Juno’s being pregnant progresses, she struggles along with her emotions for Paulie over whether or not they need to merely stay buddies as an alternative of turning into a pair.

Web page delivers the efficiency of a lifetime as Juno, alternating between hilarious to utterly weak immediately. Director Jason Reitman stacks the deck round Web page with the bigger ensemble solid, particularly with the inclusion of Allison Janney and J.Ok. Simmons taking part in Juno’s mother and father. Each actor performs their respective half to the hilt, simply delivering screenwriter Diablo Cody’s neatly written dialog, with Web page making the function of Juno all their very own. With everybody within the solid and crew firing on all cylinders, “Juno” pulls off the tough feat of someway being a feel-good film about teen being pregnant.

British journalist Lynn Barber’s 2009 memoir “An Training” was loosely tailored right into a function movie the identical yr, starring Carey Mulligan as protagonist Jenny Mellor. Jenny goals of attending the College of Oxford after finishing her education in 1961 London when she meets an older man named David (Peter Sarsgaard). Regardless of the age distinction, Jenny’s mother and father approve of the coupling, impressed by David’s obvious social connections and background. Nevertheless, as Jenny prepares to marry David and discard her collegiate goals, the darkish reality about him surfaces.

“An Training” begins out as a storybook romance, full with a lush musical soundtrack and picturesque detours to Paris as Jenny and David’s whirlwind courtship escalates. This swerves right into a darkly misleading flip of occasions, particularly given how a lot Jenny offers as much as make her relationship with David work. Mulligan performs each side of this situation effectively, avoiding outright melodrama as she retains sight of Jenny’s wounded coronary heart. A profession breakthrough for Mulligan, “An Training” performs like a duplicitously postmodern tackle a Prince Charming archetype whereas sustaining hope for its naive protagonist.

Sapphire’s acclaimed 1996 novel “Push,” was tailored into the 2009 “Valuable,” starring Gabourey Sidibe as its teenage title character. Set in 1987 Harlem, Valuable lives along with her abusive mom Mary (Mo’Nique) in poverty, elevating her daughter and pregnant along with her second little one from being raped by her absent father. Whereas Mary insists Valuable dwell on welfare by way of her youngsters, she attends an alternate faculty the place she learns the best way to learn and write. Issues between Valuable and Mary come to a head after Valuable offers start to her second little one, with Valuable able to construct a greater future for herself and her youngsters.

“Valuable” shouldn’t be a simple watch, completely grim however providing audiences a glimmer of hope for a greater tomorrow by the tip. Each actor on this all-star ensemble performs their respective components to the hilt, particularly Sidibe and Mo’Nique. “Valuable” does not pull any of its punches, however it might really feel like a disservice to the story if it did, setting the harrowing stakes earlier than including a way of empowerment. A kind of films that you simply solely watch as soon as, “Valuable” sticks with viewers in its unflinching portrait of utmost poverty and familial abuse.

Writer Stephen Chbosky bought the uncommon alternative to adapt his personal novel, adapting his 1991 e book “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” for the silver display screen in 2012. Set within the Pittsburgh suburbs within the early ’90s, Charlie (Logan Lerman) begins highschool after a stint in a psychological establishment for extreme despair. Charlie befriends siblings Patrick (Ezra Miller) and Sam (Emma Watson), becoming a member of their group of social misfits. Because the close-knit ensemble progresses by way of the varsity yr, the circumstances behind Charlie’s troubled previous are progressively revealed.

“The Perks of Being a Wallflower” is a interval piece that does not really feel like one, with the story and its themes as related now as they had been in 1991. Lerman and Miller are by no means higher than their respective roles on this film, Lerman because the withdrawn Charlie and Miller as unfailingly outgoing Patrick. An important film about the highschool expertise, “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” weaves in its heavier components at a deliberate tempo, making the heartbreak really feel extra earned. However regardless of the tragedy that the characters endure, their friendship makes life all of the extra value dwelling, rallying collectively to beat life’s largest challenges.

Parental loss and the subsequently complicated household dynamics grasp closely over the 2016 dramedy “The Fringe of Seventeen.” A number of years after shedding her father abruptly, excessive schooler Nadine Franklin (Hailee Steinfeld) nonetheless has a rocky relationship along with her mom Mona (Kyra Sedgwick) and older brother Darian (Blake Jenner). That is exacerbated when Darian begins relationship Nadine’s greatest good friend Krista (Haley Lu Richardson), making Nadine really feel betrayed and remoted. Nadine tries to make new buddies, together with along with her exasperated trainer (Woody Harrelson), as she tries to win the affections of an older classmate (Alexander Calvert).

“The Fringe of Seventeen” actually gives Steinfeld a improbable showcase to point out each her comedic and dramatic abilities in equal measure. Like all youngsters, Nadine is a very complicated and sophisticated character, and Steinfeld deftly retains her likable and relatable. Steinfeld’s extra lighthearted scenes with Harrelson supply a buoyant distinction to her rawer scenes reverse Sedgwick and Jenner and their tense familial relationship. Like its protagonist, “The Fringe of Seventeen” is, at turns, acerbic, biting, humorous, and heartbreaking, however all the time honest.

Whereas Walt Disney World will be the happiest place on Earth, these dwelling round it won’t all the time really feel that corporately manufactured magic. That juxtaposition informs the 2017 drama “The Florida Mission,” which focuses on single mom Halley (Bria Vinaite) and her six-year-old daughter Moonee (Brooklynn Kimberly Prince). Residing collectively in a funds motel close to Disney World in Kissimmee, Florida (making it top-of-the-line films set within the state), Halley struggles to make ends meet after shedding her job as a stripper. The pair’s life grows extra difficult as they meet a equally financially-strapped household led by one other single mom, Ashley (Mela Homicide).

A frank have a look at the lifetime of the underprivileged dwelling within the shadow of prefabricated pleasure, “The Florida Mission” brings coronary heart to a uncared for group. Halley and Ashley aren’t excellent mother and father, however we perceive why they every make the alternatives they make to outlive and care for his or her youngsters as greatest they understand how. Informed primarily from Moonee’s perspective, this makes the extra uncooked sequences a bit extra palpable, refracted by way of the lens of early childhood innocence. Although not an uplifting story, “The Florida Mission” gives a glimpse of empathy and understanding for a inhabitants society has largely written off as a misplaced trigger.

Whether or not it is Barbies studying the best way to grow to be human or interval piece sisters rising up, filmmaker Greta Gerwig excels at coming-of-age tales. Gerwig’s 2017 dramedy “Girl Chicken” extra explicitly locations this sensibility in an early 2000s highschool setting. Sacramento highschool senior Christine McPherson (Saoirse Ronan) who hopes to attend an East Coast college, straining her relationship along with her mom (Laurie Metcalf). Nicknamed Girl Chicken, Christine goes by way of the ultimate trials and tribulations of highschool whereas ready on her faculty acceptance determination.

Gerwig discovered a improbable collaborative associate in Ronan, completely delivering upon Gerwig’s writing and course as her semi-autobiographical protagonist. Christine’s tumultuous relationship along with her mom is the emotional centerpiece of the story, with Ronan and Metcalf capturing that fiery dynamic effectively. And as fraught as Christine’s experiences get, Gerwig nonetheless finds the incidental humor all through the film, preserving issues from being lethal severe on a regular basis. Gerwig’s masterpiece, “Girl Chicken” is a coming-of-age triumph and Ronan’s best on-screen efficiency to this point.