Valley Girl (1983)

I was not expecting too much from the 1983 teen comedy/drama ‘Valley Girl'. But to my surprise, I got a very intelligent movie that does many things that are not in your usual teen movie. Sure we have seen some big teen films, like American Graffiti, Ferris Bueller's Day Off , Mischief, Girls just wanna have fun and in recent times The ‘American Pie' Series, but Valley Girl is right up there as a very good teen film, with a cool soundtrack and a cast that really amazed me.

The strangest people fall in love and when these two opposites met, the fun just started when they tried to break down the barriers! This movie combines Hollywood punk with Valley conservative, ageing hippies with high school proms and generally shows that being a teenager CAN be outrageous fun!

The direction of ‘Valley Girl' is an area that I find to be very good indeed. It was directed in a way where you got the feeling no-one, on or off set had to be rushed, which I believe made the movie a very easy to follow. The other great aspect of the direction is that it was done extremely well by Martha Coolidge, a woman who knew exactly what she wanted to show onscreen and show it is what she did. If more directors, male and female could capture what Coolidge did with this film, more films would be much better.

The screenwriters for ‘Valley Girl' were Wayne Crawford and Andrew Lane, who did a great job in bringing out the teenage issues in the film, but did not make the mistake of basing the film totally around sex, which is what most teen films think they need to be. Instead we get a better insight into who these young people actually are. The other interesting aspect of Valley Girl is the way that the movie seems to allow itself to contain very intelligent and interesting dialogue, which for me is another highlight. I also enjoyed the characters created for the film. We get to see the hot shots of LA, the young impressionable chicks and the cool guys, who are not sleazy, but very very likeable. All in all, this story is going to stay with me for along time to come.

This leads me to the cast of the film, which was very good. Randy (A very young Nicholas Cage), by looking at him, seems just like another teenage smartass. However looks can be deceiving and Randy shows himself to be a really nice guy. The other part I like about Randy is the confident manner he has, with him stating at one stage of the movie, ‘I like the girl and she likes me, I am gunna have her'. Now that might sound like arrogance, but that is not the case, it just the cool, confident kind of guy Randy is. Nicholas Cage sure showed in this movie that he was a star of the future. Randy also has a very good friend in Fred (Cameron Dye), who stands by him many times.

The girl Randy is after is the beautiful Julie Richman (Deborah Foreman), someone who has just broken up with a real creep, Tommy (Michael Bowen), who unfortunately has not accepted it yet. Then when Julie and Randy meet at a party there is an instant attraction. Julie is a very naïve young girl, but you feel for her plight in the movie, as I know I certainly wanted her to be happy.

There are many good supporting cast members in Valley Girl. Julie's friends include Loryn (Elizabeth Daily), Stacey (Heidi Holicker), Suzie (Michelle Meyrink) and Samantha (Tina Theberge). In fact there are many moments with these girls that are great highlights of the film, including a scene that shows Julie going for her license, while three of these girls totally distra

Fmovies: I remember seeing this movie back when it was released and I still remember the 'buzz' I felt when I left the cinema. Everything about this movie is magnificent! The music is top notch and I still play the soundtrack after all these years.

I have seen this movie so many times and yet I still get yearnings to watch it again and again. Nicholas Cage was great and whenever I see Cameron Dye in anything nowadays, I always associate him with this movie. It is too bad the rest of the cast didn't go on to greater things but maybe that is part of this film's charm.

I won't do a film school critique as I am sure all the analysts out there can find fault if they wanted to, but what I will say is that this movie defined my teenage years and still continues to influence my life over 20 years later. The movie 'feels' great and stirs up emotions when you watch it (well...it did for me) and I cannot recommend it highly enough for anybody who has not yet seen it.

You either 'get' the movie or you don't! Those of you who 'get it' will be rewarded with a unique movie experience.

Happy 25th Birthday to Valley Girl! Great soundtrack, plausible story, wonderful performances...captures the spirit of the 80's; the slang of the mainstreams and the outcasts. A wonderful rendition of high school life and "gritty downtown" from a suburban perspective.

The soundtrack contains songs by Modern English, Felony, Josie Cotton, Sparks, Payola$, Josie Cotton, The Plimsouls, The Psychedelic Furs, Men At Work, The Flirts and Bananarama.

This movie truly is Romeo and Juliet (minus the double suicide) set in 1980's Los Angeles. Julie's dad, played by Frederic Forrest (Sonny Bono, anyone?) is hysterical as a hippie idealistic dad who wonders how he sprung such a materialistic offspring. Yet, he doesn't judge, ya dig??

Valley Girl fmovies. But perhaps you have to have grown up in the 80's to truly appreciate this movie. If you love the early 80's this is definitely a must see. Also, one of the best soundtracks ever!

The first time I saw Valley Girl, I was bedridden and as sick as a dog, out of junior high school for two weeks with a nasty illness. I watched it on a tiny black and white set with the volume turned down to a whisper so my parents wouldn't hear and make me shut it off. I was mesmerized. It was a revelation. Martha Coolidge's milking of the Romeo and Juliet premise (with Nicolas Cage and Deborah Foreman filling in as star-crossed lovers in the San Fernando Valley) was smart and convincing. I was amazed by the hot "Val" chicks. I was thrilled by the interesting vocabulary words. I wanted to be like Cage's tough Randy and fall in love with a beautiful girl like Foreman's Julie to the sounds of Eddie Grant, Modern English, and The Plimsouls.

Everyone has a great list of cinematic guilty pleasures, and "Valley Girl" has been on mine from the first time I saw it. It was clear from the first "valley view" of the San Fernando that it was several cuts above your average teen-aimed movie. Obviously, Nicolas Cage was pretty impressive, even if I had no idea of his heritage or his future. I liked Deborah Foreman, too, and the supporting cast was well-chosen. If the plot was trifling, it was at least clever and certainly not pretentious. And the music, from the opening by Foremen and her friends to the closing shot of the limo ride to Modern English's "I Melt With You," is a big plus. Overall, an very entertaining take on love across the valley of cultural differences from Martha Coolidge, who is one of our most underrated directors.