Paper Towns is a coming-of-age story following Quentin (Nat Wolf), a high school senior who has been in love with mysterious and enigmatic Margo (Cara Delevingne) ever since she moved in. The childhood friends who drifted apart are brought together for one night of revenge-fueled fun before Margo disappears. Quentin then recruits his friends to help him search for clues to find what happened to Margo.

Paper Towns is John Green’s second book to be adapted into a film, the first being last year’s summer hit The Fault in Our Stars. He also is having a third book, Looking for Alaska, adapted next year. Green and his brother are internet vloggers and have a huge following on YouTube. Green is known for this thought-provoking themes and unique characters.

Green has examined the theme of Paper Towns in one of his vlogs, saying that putting people on pedestals and failing to imagine their complexity, as in the case of Quentin, is “tremendously destructive.” To the world, Margo has always been the adventurous mystery next door, but to Margo she is just a paper girl in a paper town.

Given the success of The Fault in Our Stars and its fame as a sad and sappy romance, audiences might expect that Paper Towns is a romance as well, but that is not the case. Although Paper Towns is a good date movie, it is more of a comedy-drama than a romance.

As a book to movie adaptation:

The movie reflected the book’s characters and themes nicely. Fans of the book might not be delighted about the changes, but in the end they ended up holding the film’s characters and plot in light better suited for the big screen. Although the theme is softened in the movie from the book, it still resonates with the audience, emitting the same feeling readers had with the book.

The adaptation did a great job of highlighting Green’s unique and realistic characters, and the chemistry between the actors felt realistic and natural.

As a stand-alone movie:

Paper Towns is a thought provoking romantic comedy-drama angled toward teens and young adults. The audience likely will understand the underlying theme, even if it is not exactly what they were expecting to learn from the film.

Rotten Tomatoes, a movie rating website, gave Paper Towns a 58-percent approval rating from critics and a 71-percent from general audiences. Some of the negativity in reviews stems from the fact that the movie is seen, by some, as a stereotypical teenage coming-of-age story with nothing setting it distinctly apart from others. Paper Towns, ultimately, has a passing grade among critics and the viewing public.

In the end, Paper Towns is a nice, coming-of-age movie with a good lesson and an overall enjoyable film for teenagers and young adults.