Surviving Childhood: The Last Picture Show and four other unforgettable 'coming-of-age' films

A popular cinematic genre (whatever that means!) is the 'comingof-age' film. Most are works of cloying sentimentality steeped in nostalgia. Focused on a young person growing to maturity, it traipses through standard dilemmas. Ordeals are overcome. There is awakening, sexual or otherwise. There are archetypes — the rebel or outsider is favoured as conformists are dull and limit dramatic possibilities. The settings are cliques and milieus centred around schools and communities which set out stereotypical social hierarchies.

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A few films transcend the strictures of the formula and remain enduring works. Peter Bogdanovich's The Last Picture Show (1971) and Paper Moon (1973) stand out amidst the Hollywood dross.

Based on a Larry McMurty novel, The Last Picture Show shared the sensibility and evocation of America present in Bob Rafelson's Five Easy Pieces (1970). Shot in cold black-and-white, it opens with a panning shot from the cinema across a deserted main street while a car drives by. The sound is a car radio playing Hank Williams' "Why Don’t You Love Me (Like You Used To Do)?"