I didn't review Foxes for a while because Comcast (my '80s movie supplier) labeled it as 1979. But, it turns out, it's actually 1980 - February, 1980 according to IMDB. So it's fair game.
Foxes is a movie I had always heard about but never seen (until now). Supposedly Jodie Foster's best performance as a young adult (it is), it's the tale of four girls growing up the hard way in the San Fernando Valley in the late 1970s disco era.
The script is really good, because all four of the friends (and everyone else in the movie) is written very realistically. These are girls I could have known growing up - and in fact, I did know girls like them in high school.
Jodie Foster is the highlight, as desperate-to-be-done-with-this-adolescence-thing Jeanie. Jeanie is the mother figure to her friends... and to her own mom, who had Jeanie when she was about 16 herself. The other members of the quartet are Madge, who is overweight (I guess, for the '70s?) and a virgin and tired of both things; Deirdre, who is boy crazy and doesn't know what to do with her budding sexuality; and Annie. Ohhhhhh boy, Annie. Annie is a real mess. Annie does everything to extreme excess. Drugs, drink, boys, more drugs, risky behavior of every single type. Annie is memorably played by former Runaways rock star Cherie Currie, who bears a cherry tattoo on her right shoulder in commemoration of the Runaways hit "Cherry Bomb."
Jeanie (and the audience) spends more time worrying about Annie than about most movie characters I can remember. Annie's dad is an abusive cop constantly chasing her down. Annie's ability to make good decisions doesn't appear to exist. Annie is just racing for the bottom.
The movie is somewhat slow, but when it gets going, it REALLY gets going. There are a few really moving scenes - the opening, when the four girls wake up and get ready for school, or later when Jeanie tries to have a nice, adult dinner party that collapses when Annie arrives and can't take it seriously, or when we learn Annie's final fate (no spoilers here, folks). And especially the heart-breaking final voiceover from Jeanie.
Also, it's crazy to see Madge marrying Randy Quaid (!) of all people. I can't imagine how that marriage is going to work out. And to round out the cast list, Jeanie's boyfriend Brad is played by Scott Baio (!!) who really comes through in a pinch later in the movie.
But obviously the real star here is Foster. She's a revelation as a young actress, the kind we hardly ever see anymore - capable in turns of being a small adult or a large child, of being both cynical and vulnerable, jaded and devastated in the same breath. She's a real marvel.
Foxes is, in truth, a product of the late '70s decadent SoCal disco excess. It prefigures the '80s in some ways, especially the obsession with southern California and the obsession with teenage girls and their culture.
It was, interestingly, the feature film debut of director Adrian Lyne, who is well known for Flashdance, Fatal Attraction, Jacob's Ladder, 9.5 Weeks, and Indecent Proposal. IMDB doesn't seem to have money data for it, but Wikipedia says it earned $7.5 million - not bad, but without knowing how much it cost it's impossible to say if it did well or not. With a movie like this, though, it really doesn't matter. I was really impressed. Recommended.
Now we completely switch gears: Maximum Overdrive (1986), based on a Stephen King short story called "Trucks," and featuring Emilio Estevez, Pat Hingle, and Yeardley Smith (yes, THAT Yeardley Smith!).
This movie is as unrealistic as Foxes is realistic. The premise, as a cheesy graphic informs us at the beginning, is that the earth is passing through the tail of a comet for the next seven or eight days. While we're in the comet, machines gain a life of their own... especially the semis at a remote truck stop, who begin to terrorize the truck stop inhabitants with murderous intent.
There is almost nothing else to say. The "plot" consists of ex-con Estevez trying to rescue everyone. There are a few amusing parts - when you think "machines going crazy" you probably don't think of cigarette machines and dollar changers spitting out quarters and cigs for a delighted pinball wizard who is then mysteriously electrocuted by a primitive video game.
And the over-the-top acting results in a few unintentionally funny sequences, like when the gas nozzle turns on the truck driver. How much could that POSSIBLY hurt?? Or the soda machine at the ballpark, combined with the insane steamroller. Do the deaths have to be that gory!??! They are really over the top for a movie like this. Almost cartoonish.
The movie is chock full of moments like this. My favorite subplot involves Yeardley Smith and her new husband battling various machines while she throws out great dialog: "Is he dead?" ::car races at husband, crashes into building:: "Are YOU dead??" ... it's fantastic.
Estevez, meanwhile, is basically reliving his character from Repo Man - the same nihilistic delinquent who reluctantly does the does right thing, sometimes.
Maximum Overdrive was actually directed by Stephen King, who must have had a blast, and remains the ONLY movie he has directed. Maybe because the movie didn't make any money - according to IMDB, it cost ten million to make and only came back with $7,500,000 or so.
But another reason, at least according to IMDB trivia, is that King was apparently coked out of his mind during the entire filming (it shows). In fact, the very next trivia entry is rather hilarious - asked why he hasn't directed a movie since Maximum Overdrive, he replied "Just watch Maximum Overdrive." ZING.
Come on, Stephen, it's not that bad. You had great taste with the AC/DC soundtrack, anyway.
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