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Show Valley Girl' and 'Heartbreakers still shine yUlttiit'S and lilobln Moench As background information on seminar participants in this year's United States Film Festival program, pro-gram, Record entertainment writer Rick Brough ' includes two movie reviews from 1985 in his regular coU umnfhis week. Martha Coolidge, director of "Valley Girl," and Bobby Roth, director of "Heartbreakers," will appear in seminars on media crossover and marketing, repective-ly, repective-ly, next weekend at the Egyptian Theatre. The film festival will run from Jan. 17 through 26 in Parfe City. Valley Girl "Romeo and Juliet" is updated in a quirky, perceptive comedy in this movie, which also may be seen in future years as an entertaining document of the '80s. It was deftly directed by Martha Coolidge, a panelist in one of this year's United States Film Festival seminars, "Crossovers," that will be held at the Egyptian Theatre on Jan. 25. A "city punker (Nicholas Cage) falls in love with a cute blonde from the San Fernando Valley (Deborah Foreman). They're an uneven match, but the two actors create a believable warmth. Coolidge shows how each lover is out of place in the other's environment. environ-ment. But the Valley is definitely painted as the worse habitat of the two. The early scenes, with the girls talking fluent "Valley-ese," are as strange and exotic as a National Geographic special on African tribes. The Valley heroine starts to become a real human being around her new boyfriendd. But she is pressured to stick with her old life by her clique of friends. If the film is weak at all, it is in its Coyote also will attend. Artist Arthur Blue (Coyote), lanky and laid-back, and businessman Eli Kahn (Nick Mancuso), who wears his suit like a second skin, are an odd couple. But they also share a long, cherished relationship in which they complement each other like two big jigsaw puzzle pieces. Arthur, usually the romantic success suc-cess of the two, has just lost his woman friend, but he is beginning to earn recognition for his art. Eli, good at business but gun-shy at romance, is beginning a hopeful relationship with a woman (Carole Laure). But when Arthur falls for her, too, the envy and tension between bet-ween the two men surface. Even if two puzzle pieces fit together perfectly, sooner or later each one will wish it were the whole picture. Roth, who also wrote the scyipt, tells his story with intelligence, economy, a nice balance between wit and drama and charming performances. perfor-mances. Coyote shows the strains and cracks in his flamboyant artist and, conversely, Mancuso doesn't leave the likability out of his straight character. There's at least one nice moment for everyone in the supporting cast: Laure gives a tremendously alluring performance; Max Gail is a rival ar-I ar-I ist who is a less callous bruiser than you expect at first; Kathryn Harrold is perhaps a shade too unsympathetic unsym-pathetic as Blue's ex-love; and the late Carole Wayne is an accommodating accom-modating big-breasted model who is Now Showing At the Holiday Village Cinemas: Rocky IV 2SpiesLikeUs 2 White Nights Young Sherlock Holmes emphasis of the clash of cultures instead in-stead of the romance. However, it also brings in an interesting subplot about the Valley girl's aging hippie parents (Frederic Forrest, Colleen Camp) who cling to their protest days by running a health food store. Their daughter wishes they owned a Pizza Hut. While they stayed liberal, their kids have gone back to middle-class middle-class conservatism. The best scene is a reversal of parent-teen encounters. This time, it is dad who nervously smokes a joint, prepping himself to meet his daughter's tuxedoed, stodgy boyfriend. "Valley Girl" sails along on such touches, fer shurr. RB VaHeartbreakers "Heartbreakers" was one of last year's best films and certainly one of the must-sees of the 1985 United States Film Festival. This year, its director, Bobby Roth, will be a panelist in a film festival seminar, "Case Study," which will be held at the Egyptian Theatre Jan. 23. It will discuss the mishandled marketing of the promising pro-mising independently-produced film by a major distributor. Actor Peter nevertheless no one's fool. The picture's complexities seem to be lumped toward the second half of the story too much, but "Heart-breakers" "Heart-breakers" is a welcome movie, indeed. in-deed. RB . 'White Nights Superstar Nikolai Rodqhenko studied classical ballet in the theater that produced Nijinsky and Balan-chine. Balan-chine. Raymond Greenwood picked up tap in Harlem. While Rodchenko pirouetted in the White House, Greenwood tapped out "Porgy and Bess'' to an accordion band in Siberia. " ' Mikhail Baryshnikov as the lionized lioniz-ed Russian ballet star and Gregory Hines as the stifled American tap dancer both are defectors to one . another's native lands. Can these two political and professional profes-sional opposites cooperate and free themselves? In a story that drags a little when the two aren't dancing, you'll find that, of course, they can. The movie makes a point of showing show-ing us ballet dancers occasionally smoke, drink, have bad table manners man-ners and use four-letter words that aren't "plie." Baryshnikov has the courage to be obnoxious in his role as a star and human as the private person beyond the applause. And Hines has the courage to play second fiddle to a man who has been called the world's greatest living dancer. In the process, he shows us the dazzle of his less-appreciated dance tradition. The alliance comes about when a plane carrying Rodchenko from one tour date to another crashes in the Soviet Union. The defector is a criminal in his homeland. A menacing menac-ing KGB man, Chainko (played sneeringly by Jerzy Skolimowski), promises Rodchenko his old elitist's life if he'll dance at the Kirov again. Rodchenko's unwilling watchdog is Greenwood, who left the United States in protest of the Vietnam war. If he cooperates with Chainko, he and his Russian wife will have a better bet-ter life. Rodchenko's former partner and lover (Helen Mirren) first refuses to help him escape to the American consulate, then changes her mind in a scene in the empty theater that is Baryshnikov s best dance sequence, angry and victorious. And Hines' best tap is in a rehearsal rehear-sal hall where he's carried away by a tape of rhythmic new American music. Great dancers are seldom great actors, but in this case, the two dancers turn in creditable performances. perfor-mances. More than a decade ago, Baryshnikov defected from the Soviet Union to pursue professional freedom in the West. But he said the story, while similar to his, is not autobiographical. In a recent interview, inter-view, he said his dream is to go home. He added that, ironically, he probably lost his last chance by making this movie. Geraldine Page plays the ballet dancer's feisty promoter. Isabella Rossellini eerily like her mother, Ingrid Bergman is Greenwood's wife. Twyla Tharp choreographed the dance sequences. RM k A Classic Recommended Good double feature material Time-killer For masochists only |
