You know how a woman says "I'm not 16 anymore" as a prelude to making decisions and realigning her life? It's a phrase that signals her decision to stick to one guy, one career, a single brand of facial cream. Goodbye to psychedelic craziness, hello to . . . smoking cigarettes in bed, in the dark, on sleepless nights. Oh well.
The question here is: Why 16? Why hit upon it as the magic number that divides a woman's life into the Before and After? If age 16 is receding further away in the distance, it may be a good thing to dig up some answers in a work called "Lover Girl" (released in Japan as "Candy Lover Girl").
Created by N.Y. indies duo Lisa Addario and Joe Syracuse, "Lover Girl" masks its brilliance behind artsy, low-budget filmmaking. But there's no disguising the fact that it reaches out and grabs hold of something that sleeps in all of us: the sensations and desires of the Summer of 16. Remember what that was like? It only comes around once, then it's gone and you forget it for a long, long time -- until something like "Lover Girl" comes along. Think of it as an activator of a Proustian rush.