EARTH GIRLS ARE EASY
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1989 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Helium-weight comedy has a typical Valley Girl (played by Geena Davis) meeting a bright blue furry alien (played by Jeff Goldblum looking like a flea- market bathmat). EARTH GIRLS is based on the Julie Brown song of the same title. Director Julien Temple also directed ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS and it was much better. Rating: high 0.
It all started when witty and moderately attractive Julie Brown nearly made it to being chosen homecoming queen. As she tells it, rather than just being disappointed she struck back by writing songs making fun of all the institutions her friends enjoyed. Her songs--now a popular staple of the Dr. Demento show--include "Everybody Run, the Homecoming Queen's Got a Gun," "'Cause I'm a Blond," and "Earth Girls Are Easy." The last was done in a Valley Girl accent as an air-head describes a close encounter of a fourth kind with non-humanoid aliens. When the song was sold to be made as a film, Brown rephrased it to delete the non-humanoid references. She also co-wrote the script and plays a prominent role in the film.
EARTH GIRLS ARE EASY hides the fact that it is really a British production, directed by Julian Temple. Temple directed the kinetically stunning ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS, which unfortunately never found its market and which died at the boxoffice. EARTH GIRLS is a much less ambitious film, but it probably is light and mindless enough to make the profit the other film missed.
EARTH GIRLS ARE EASY opens with a sort of pop-art spaceship in a pop- art space scene. Inside are three shaggy aliens, each one of the primary colors (red, yellow, and blue), and each looking for female companionship. Loneliest of all is Mac (played by Jeff Goldblum), who is not just merely blue, he's really most sincerely blue. But our three aliens strike it lucky: they pick up a television broadcast from Earth and discover that this planet has girls!
Meanwhile, one such girl is Valerie (played by Geena Davis--a mere decade too old for the role). Valerie, the Valley Girl air-head of the song, is engaged to Ted (played by--can you believe it?--Charles Rocket!), a doctor who cannot resist *playing* doctor whenever he is given the opportunity. Julie catches Ted about to play "Dr. Love" with a nurse and she throws him out of his own house.
[Sorry--this next part has to be done in Valley Girl accent.] Well, like she's feeling all bummed out the next day, ya know, and like sitting next to Ted's pool soaking up sun when--like wow!--this totally tubular spaceship falls out of the sky and like, ya know, splashes down right there in the pool. Awesome! She should know she can't make it with Mac because he's like blue, ya know, and all covered with hair. And, like they're from two different worlds. But then, hey, this is science fiction. [Okay, that's enough of that.]
Temple's view of Americans is not very perceptive. His production numbers look like they are borrowed from GREASE and from 1960s beach blanket movies. He does have one very nice dream sequence, an homage to the props of better-known science fiction films, but that is as close as EARTH GIRLS ARE EASY ever gets to art. If there is an idea to this sci-fi (in the worst sense) film Temple has made clear that it is an unwelcome guest and has sentenced it to solitary confinement. I rate this cotton candy film a 0 on the -4 to +4 scale. Like wow.
Mark R. Leeper
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