Mile End Kicks

I wish we got more movies like Mile End Kicks. Chandler Levack’s nostalgia-tinged coming-of-age drama drops viewers into Montreal’s early-2010s music scene through the eyes of Grace (an excellent Barbie Ferreira), a 22-year-old aspiring music critic who relocates to write a 33 1/3 book on Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill. It’s a hazy indie romance, a music-scene hangout movie, and a story about chasing reinvention all at once. On paper, it sounds like a knockout—a modern cousin to Almost Famous or the kind of deeply personal coming-of-age films made by Cameron Crowe, Richard Linklater, Greta Gerwig, or Cooper Raiff.

The film is partially inspired by Levack’s own early adulthood as a music critic, which should give it the lived-in specificity that separates great hangout movies from merely good ones. In execution, though, I found myself less satisfied. Mile End Kicks is ambitious and clearly personal, but it never quite captures the sharp observational detail or memorable supporting characters needed to elevate it. What consistently works is Ferreira, who carries the film with ease. The movie understands the allure of picking up your life in your early twenties and starting over somewhere new, only to slowly realize adulthood eventually catches up with you. Ferreira sells that feeling beautifully.

Much of Grace’s time in Montreal revolves around indie punk band Bone Patrol and her attempts to spark relationships with two of its members, Archie (Devon Bostick) and lead singer Chevy (Stanley Simons). The problem is that neither character is given enough depth for the audience to understand what draws Grace to them in the first place. Jay Baruchel and Juliette Gariépy provide some welcome support, particularly in the film’s warmer moments, but the ensemble never generates the chemistry necessary to make the story’s emotional beats fully land.

What ultimately keeps Mile End Kicks afloat is its atmosphere. Levack captures the messy energy of your early twenties well, and her recreation of 2011 Montreal feels authentic enough that you can practically smell the bar shows and cheap apartments. Cecile Believe’s score and Jeremy Cox’s cinematography wrap everything in a warm, dreamy glow that suits the material perfectly. I may wish the film were better because it comes so close to being something special, but it never quite reaches the heights of films like Licorice Pizza, Shithouse, or Sorry, Baby. Still, Levack has now delivered two successful mid-budget films in the same year, and Ferreira once again proves she’s more than capable of carrying a movie.