Valley Girl
If there is a phrase to explain the enduring reputation of Valley Girl, a low-budget teen comedy released in early 1983 which pulled in fifty times its budget at the US box office and has maintained a legion of devotees and inspired a sub-genre unto itself which includes such diverse films as Clueless and the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it might be “you had to be there,” as forty years later and making its UK home video debut on Blu-ray as part of the Eureka Classics range it is difficult to understand the lasting appeal.
Starring April Fool’s Day‘s Deborah Foreman as Julie Richman, devoted to shopping for clothes and shoes at the mall and working at her parents’ health food store, she and her friends live in the San Fernando Valley, a stone’s throw from Los Angeles but a world away as emphasised by the opening aerial shot over the Hollywood Hills to the mountains and misty valleys beyond.
Breaking up with her boyfriend Tommy (Michael Bowen), Julie spends a day at the beach drinking Pepsi and eating French fries to clear her mind but catches the eye of city boy Randy (Nicolas Cage) whose friend Fred (Cameron Dye) overhears the details of the party the girls are throwing that night; oddly stilted with stiff dancing and a bizarre sushi and salad combo platter served; Randy shows up uninvited but is promptly evicted by the possessive Tommy, but sneaking back in the bathroom window he manages to talk to Julie and invite her out for a night on the town.
Directed by Martha Coolidge from a script co-written with Andrew Lane, the stereotypical Valley Girl has a reputation for being shallow, superficial and inconsequential, and that is what the film emphasises; while there is a sadness and vulnerability to Julie, who by her own admission is “supposed to be developing into my own person,” she is ineffectual, standing by passively without protest when her ex beats Randy up then eventually breaking up with Randy because her friends tell her she won’t be invited to any parties as long as she is with him.
The first lead role for Renfield‘s Nicolas Cage following a brief appearance in Fast Times at Ridgemont High the previous year, Randy accuses Julie of being programmed, and undeniably she is sheltered and privileged, but his presumably independently thinking man is no improvement, hailing from a time when stalking was considered endearing as he first breaks into a house he has been thrown out of then later shows up in a variety of disguises at places he knows Julie will be, even camping outside her bedroom window when she refuses to talk to him.
The new edition of Valley Girl featuring an audio commentary from Martha Coolidge and another from Maya Montañez Smukler and Maria San Filippo, there are also interviews with Deborah Foreman, Colleen Camp who plays Julie’s mother Sarah and over three hours of additional archive interviews as well as two vintage documentaries and music videos and in the limited edition of the first 3,000 copies a hardbound slipcase and sixty-page collector’s booklet.
Valley Girl will be available on Blu-ray from Eureka from Monday 18th September
