Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist (2008)

Norah: There's this part of Judaism that I like. Tikun Olam. It said that the world is broken into pieces and everyone has to find them and put them back together.
Nick: Maybe we don't have to find it. Maybe we are the pieces.
Norah: Nick? I'm coming in... [she goes into the recording studio to have sex with him]

Sound like teenagers?

Nick: [leaving a message on his ex-girlfriend Tris’s phone] I think we both said some things we didn't mean, like... when you broke up with me... on my b-day.

Sounds like a teenager.

Here are some difficulties when writing adolescent dialogue. Go heavy (Exhibit A) and they don’t sound / feel like teenagers. Go humorous (Exhibit B) and the seriousness / intensity dissipates tremendously.

Norah: This is amazing! You are literally like my music soul mate.

Exhibit C is probably right on. But it feels absolutely empty. What is the value in a music soul mate? It is interesting because it sounds right (the misuse of literally, the rhythmic addition of like, the clichéd soul mate) and sounds fresh (whoever heard of a music soul mate?), but there isn’t much substance here. This leads to the bigger question of how much we can lean on adolescent voices to impart something meaningful to the viewer / reader. It’s tricky because we are quite reductive when we think about teenage relationships / feelings / emotions / knowledge. It’s so easy for the viewer to toss these in the file marked “trivial” or "they'll get over it." But, I’ve always been a big fan of teenagers. In story, they are often reliable sources or energy and intensity. Desirous, emotional, fickle, unpredictable youth usually equal adventure—something this film relies on too heavily.

I long to see teens treated seriously. And I’m interested in doing so using their own voices. Some of the moments in the film that I found particularly engaging were those where Nick and Norah reflected on their past relationships. I think that teenagers reflect on the past is too often overlooked. In fact, it seems common sense that teenagers obsess with the (not very distant) past. So, reflection is a real opportunity to let loose a serious, adolescent voice. For one, reflecting is a shared experience—the audience can relate. Also, reflection requires specificity. The character has to refer to specific actions and names and dates. The character doesn’t have to (and probably shouldn’t) get abstract, which is the point where I think most of us stop listening to teenagers because we think they have so little life experience (note exhibit D). Finally, if the teenager reflects as a teenager and not as an adult (the most common way to work around the problem of adolescent stories), then the wound is still fresh, the intensity is naturally higher, years and years haven’t gone by. Try it = write the dialogue of a teenager who is reflecting on a recent, past experience.

Exhibit D

Thom: You just haven't figured it out yet, have you?
Nick: What?
Thom: ...The big picture.
Nick: I guess not.
Thom: The Beatles.
Nick: What about them?
Thom: This. [grabs Nick's hand] Look, other bands, they want to make it about sex or pain, but you know, The Beatles, they had it all figured out, okay? "I Want to Hold Your Hand." The first single. It's F-ing brilliant, right?... That's what everybody wants, Nicky. They don't want a twenty-four-hour hump sesh, they don't want to be married to you for a hundred years. They just want to hold your hand.

Eh.