[Mr. Coppola has neither a personal statement to make in You're a Big Boy Now nor a personal style in which to make it.] His story is a compendium of clichés partially disguised in fancy dress, and his style is an anthology of what used to be new among the avant-garde pussycats—tricks and gimmicks that have now been so thoroughly absorbed into film language that you can see them any night on the television commercials. (pp. 98-9)

To give this mess movement, Mr. Coppola relies very heavily on shots of people running through the streets…. Sometimes people run around for no reason at all—they just run, run, run to demonstrate what free spirits some of the younger characters would be if the world were not so much with them. What they are running from or through or (in misguided moments) to are lots of crazy...