The united states of freedom, community and alienation (especially the teenage kind) are eloquently suffused throughout the exquisite Paranoid Park. Gus Van Sant's sublime coming-of-age film continues his project of melancholic, confused youth struggling to find their way, but truly ups the cinematic ante. As we are introduced in overlapping time scenes to Van Sant's MySpace-cast Renaissance cherub, Alex (Gabe Nevins), he's not ready for Paranoid Park, the skateboarding Mecca of Portland. His parents are divorcing, he's about to lose his virginity, and, oh, he's probably killed a man by accident. The pointed question Van Sant asks is: In what kind of a society would an innocent assume he wouldn't be believed if he told the truth?

Based on Blake Nelson's book, Paranoid Park is set in a literary present: most of the scenes are flashbacks written by Alex, and the resulting chorus of voices, plus perfectly employed Nino Rota music, approximates the feeling of paranoia. Though it's not fully developed in Paranoid Park--set on "Citizenship Day"--Van Sant takes baby steps towards establishing a source for Alex's paranoid disengagement. The film expresses, powerfully, that social and political issues aren't natural states of being, but learned from one's peers. Meanwhile, indelible images linger, many shot by Christopher Doyle in slo-mo, like boarders literally flying through the 1.37 frame, or their pendulum-like motion, swinging back and forth in a massive industrial tube, remaining in a state of limbo, not sure where to go. This is film language that is pure Van Sant, and quite probably a masterpiece.

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