Ghost World

Starting our evening of films of teenage angst and disaffection is Ghost World. Based on a series of comic books of the same name, it follows Enid (Thora Birch) and Becky (Scarlett Johansson), a pair of High School drop-outs as they graduate and work out what to do with the rest of their lives. Having promised each other that they would find a flat and live together, they soon find that things aren’t that easy.

Forced to attend a ‘remedial art class for fuck-ups and retards’ while Becky goes to work in a coffee shop, Enid makes enemies of her hilariously dappy teacher (“I call this piece ‘Father, Mirror’ and I feel it says so much about who I am and what it feels like to inhabit my specific skin”) and her pet student who specialises in ‘found art’ (tampons in tea-cups, and coat hanger sculptures), whilst developing a relationship with a pathetic music collector called Seymour (Steve Buscemi) and finding herself drifting rapidly away from her best friend.

A darkly comic tale of an outsider railing against the conformist world she’s dropped into through no choice of her own, finding love in a world that hates you, thrift-shop chic, weirdoes with nun-chucks (if you love this guy - and how could you not - then hang around till the end of the credits), and 1920s blues, it’s sad and very funny in equal measure without ever becoming depressing. It’s also extremely hard to do justice to in a review like this, so you’ll have to take my word for it and come along...