Have teen movies gotten shittier or is my love of Valley Girl just shot through with nostalgia? I don't think it's nostalgia, since in 1983 I was only 4 years old and the styles, attitudes and music on display in Valley Girl don't really hold a personal connection for me. Maybe its that I wish I could climb inside the screen and live in its simpler world, complete with rad Adidas sneakers and vests with a hundred zippers.
Part of what I like about Valley Girl, and what I think seems to be missing from equivalent films today, is the verisimilitude of youth. Certainly teen movies have gotten more profane, trying to one-up each other with bodily fluids, and substance use, but its always really broad and cartoonish. The sex, drugs and rock n roll of teen movies from the 80's was usually treated as incidental, a given or par for the course. There was rarely a big wink to the audience whenever somebody passed a joint and tits often streaked across the screen without the YOWZA-YOWZA handling of the American Pie mold.
These days, if a teen smokes a bong in a movie it has to be the BIGGEST bong you've ever seen, or if the nerd gets to score with a chick it's a Playboy bunny with inflatable tits.
Most teen movies today come pre-packaged in one of two categories: Outrageously Jizz-tastic(see Miss March), or Girly (see Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants). Jizzy, party-animal content does not reach the latter and anything resembling emotion or maturity does not appear in the former. But in films like Valley Girl, and perhaps more famously, Fast Times At Ridgemont High, there was room for both, just like in the lives of real teens.
In Valley Girl, kids party and kids fuck and it isn't treated as hijinks's or milked for bawdy pratfalls. It's just the natural state of things. The focus here anyway is a relocation of Romeo & Juliet to Hollywood and the Valley, and even then the movie doesn't bother to push it too far into high-concept territory.
Julie is prom-queen material from the Valley. Randy is a new wave-er from Hollywood. The unwritten law of the land says that these two should never meet, but when Randy crashes a preppy Valley party, sparks fly between him and Julie. Randy is Julie's animated and charming tour guide to "real life" as they both forget their segregated roles and fall in love. Julie's friends of course disapprove, complicating her perfect little Valley life. That's about it. Nothing overly dramatic happens, no big twists of fate toss them like ragdolls through the plot. It's a fairly understated little movie and it leaves a near-constant smile on your face.
Did I mention that Randy is played by Nicolas fucking Cage? Well he is, and his big-break performance clearly foretells both the leading man charm and oddball scene chewing that will later define his career.
Oh, and the music is really good too.
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