1980-A group of four
teenage girls in the San Fernando Valley {An
urbanized valley in
southern California, lying mostly within the city limits of Los Angeles}, and the usual problems teenagers have to cope with. Deidre is fascinated by her sexuality, likes boys and has lots of boy troubles. Madge is unhappily overweight and mad that she's a virgin. Plus, her parents are overprotective and she has an annoying younger sister. Annie is a teen runaway who drinks and pops pills, and runs away from her abusive father. Jeanie has to take care of them and is fighting with her divorced mother. They think that the school is rubbish, their boyfriends are immature and the grown-ups have come from another planet and are more in need of "growing up" than they are.
The movie was striking for me, because it seemed to mirror the teen years that I was leading in California...the characters were versions of your own friends, and their tragedies hit home too.
For all those who watched friends go nowhere in life, die young or make a success of themselves...this movie is nostalgic.
Stars Jodie Foster, Sally Kellerman, Scott Baio and an extremely touching and wrenching
performance by Cherie Currie (The Runaways).
"She wanted to be buried under a
pear tree and have
the roots grow right through her, so all her
friends could come once a year and eat a pear and say, "Mmm, She sure is tasting good this year."
