By John Corrado

Max Minghella’s flashy directorial debut Teen Spirit, which premiered at TIFF last year and enjoyed a theatrical release in the spring, is being released on DVD this week. The film follows Violet (Elle Fanning), a 17-year-old from a small town in the UK who dreams of becoming a pop star, and secretly enters a singing competition with an alcoholic former opera singer (Zlatko Buric) acting as her guardian and manager.

This is a derivative and fairly predictable story about a young singer trying to make it big, but Fanning is quite good in the lead and the musical numbers are entertaining, with the film offering an appealing soundtrack of pop songs. It’s a slight but still fairly enjoyable movie that would make an alright rental, and for more on the film itself, you can read my full review right here.

The DVD also includes a commentary track with Minghella, producer Fred Berger and executive producer Jamie Bell, the two brief featurettes The Story Behind Teen Spirit and Creating Music for the Film, as well as a trio of music videos for the songs “Little Bird,” “Dancing On My Own” and “Wildflowers” which feature footage of Fanning performing and doing her own singing. See it for her.

Teen Spirit is an Elevation Pictures release. It’s 93 minutes and rated PG.

Street Date: July 16th, 2019