'Hot Summer Nights' Loves The '90s, But Not Its Main Character
The only solid insight to be gleaned from Hot Summer Nights, a nostalgia-soaked coming-of-age drama set in 1991 Cape Cod, is learning the DVDs that doubtlessly line the shelves of its writer-director, Elijah Bynum: Goodfellas, American Graffiti, Boogie Nights, The Sandlot, and perhaps the complete Wonder Years box set, to name a few.
Other movies turn up to mark the time — , , and appear together on is an era-defining event — but its sense of the period is as scattershot as its influences. There's the residue of '80s fashion, with its crimps and scrunchies and high-riding Guess jeans, a pot-dealing greaser who looks like a character from S.E. Hinton's , and a soundtrack that dips curiously in early-to-mid '70s cuts like Harry Nilsson's "Early in the Morning" and The Modern Lovers' "Hospital."
