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Valley Girl (Special Edition)Rating:
Release Date: 05 August, 2003 Retail Price: $14.94 OUR Price: $10.99 You SAVE: $3.95! Cast: Complete Cast (10 total) |
Valley Girl (Special Edition) Reviews
Like, Almost Totally Gross!
Although Valley Girl came out when I was a teenager, it somehow eluded me until now. I bought it because of the favorable reviews, and of course, for the sheer nostalgia. I won't say it's a BAD movie, but I would compare it directly to The Last American Virgin in terms of screenplay, story and acting. Unlike The Last American Virgin, however, this film has an awful sountrack, and it didn't really end in a notable way.
From a filmmaking standpoint, this seems amateurish. Apparently this is where director Martha Coolidge cut her teeth, because she went on to direct the remarkably good college film, Real Genius, just two years later.
The big problem with this film is shallowness. We never learn much about any of the characters, so it's not easy to care about them. I still can't figure out why the lead characters were attracted to each other, since the only way they ever describe each other is "hot". They never engage in deep conversations or share secrets with each other. There's no depth to the relationship at all.
Another problem is that all the high school students in this film appear to be about 18-22 years old, while the sexy mother of one teenage girl appears to be under 30 years old herself. A whole subplot that revolves around the mother (Beth, played by Lee Purcell) is unsatisfactorily resolved about half-way throught the film, then never mentioned again. Even so, I like her temptations a lot more than Stifler's Mom in American Pie!
Lisa Foreman's lead character, Julie, behaves less like a "Valley Girl" of the 1980's than she does an ordinary middle class teenager living in Overland Park, Kansas. If you're familiar with Moon Unit Zappa's song, "Valley Girl", you'll find almost none of that kind of language in this film. Nicolaus Cage's character, Randy, is likeable enough, but he looks more like a member of Jefferson Starship than a "punk" (his almost mullet-like hair is blown upward on top--that's it!). Unfortunately, for an "odd couple" story like this to work, you need to emphasize the extreme difference between the characters. But these characters could have easily been neighbors from childhood. They don't seem at all from the other side of the tracks.
The obligatory montage scene fails because it continues for the entire length of the song, "I'll Melt With You". A montage is meant to compress time, and dragging it out for an entire song defeats that purpose. They should have faded it out after 45-60 seconds for more effect.
The most entertaining characters in the film, by far, are Julie's parents--a couple of former hippies who were obviously the prototype for Berke Lander's parents in the hilarious 2001 teen film, "Get Over It".
The soundtrack, too, is terribly inferior to The Last American Virgin, and doesn't represent the early 1980's well at all. Only the aforementioned "I'll Melt With You" stands out as a great song. Meanwhile, a tune that repeats the question "Johnny Are You Queer?" seems oddly out of place at a preppy high school prom.
From a nostalgia standpoint, I didn't feel like I was watching an 80's movie at all. In fact, the most pleasant nostalgia in the film was seeing ashtrays on every table (even though the characters didn't smoke), which reminded me for the first time in years that California was once part of a free country, and wasn't always ruled by neurotics. Frankly, I was surprised that the Orwellian thought-police hadn't airbrushed all those ashtrays out of the film. Today, every surface in California is littered with a fear-mongering Proposition 65 warning stickers instead. I'm so grateful I was a teenager in the 1980's, rather than today!
Overall, this film fails on too many counts to recommend it, but I wouldn't blame you for checking it out. It's good enough fun for 99 minutes. The Special Edition DVD adds quite a few features that make the DVD worthwhile, if you can get it cheap!
Nick has come a long way.
I really miss the 80's. So innocent and fun. Well, Valley girl Julie is bored with Football boyfriend Tommy and wants a new relationship with Punker Randy(Nick). Her friends try to talk her out of Randy and stay with Tommy, but Julie just can't resist a mohawk. Good for an 80's high school type movie. What ever happened to Deborah Foreman? Enjoy!
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