For most people, adolescence is a lonely, often humiliating time and, writer-director Tamara Jenkins argues in the perceptive "Slums of Beverly Hills," it's a lot lonelier and more humiliating if you have the misfortune to be the only female in a family that's more worried about staying a step ahead of creditors than it is concerned making about your adjustment to womanhood easier. Such is the plight of 14-year-old Vivian Abramovitz (Natasha Lyonne, who played Woody Allen's scheming daughter in "Everyone Says I Love You") in 1976 Los Angeles. She thinks her recently developed breasts are a curse, since they make her the butt of coarse jokes. Even worse, her father Murray (Alan Arkin) doesn't see anything wrong with dragging Vivian and her brothers Ben (David Krumholtz) and Rickey (Eli Marienthal) all over the city in a series of impromptu moves, most of which happen shortly before the rent is due on whatever "dingbat" apartment they're in. Vivian complains but her words fail to sway Murray. So the Abramovitzs drift from one semi-seedy home to another, finally landing on the very brink of Beverly Hills because Murray wants to take advantage of the good school system. "Is this it?" Vivian asks as the quartet settles in at their so-called "luxury" digs at the Camelot, decorated in ghastly shades of harvest gold. "Are we bourgeoise yet?" Reminiscent of Patty Dann's charming novel "Mermaids" and the delightful 1990 film based on it, Jenkins' semi-autobiographical screenplay is a haunting reminder of what it feels like to be the kind of unfortunate teen who gets caught almost everytime she tries something a little adventurous. When he sees his daughter all but spilling out of a halter, Murray insists Vivian wear an over-the-shoulder bra underneath the top. And luckless Vivian is later discovered by her dad dancing (which is bad enough) while clutching a certain item (which makes it much, much worse). Although she's the center of attention in almost every scene, Lyonne proves she's more than up to the challenge of carrying "Slums." She never overplays Vivian's gawkiness nor her petulance, finding a charming middle ground. Though it's a sad fact of Hollywood life that "unusual-looking" young women like Lyonne rarely go on to major stardom, here's hoping this offbeat beauty can beat the odds; she's genuinely funny and easy to identify with. Arkin, who too often underplays to the point of becoming wallpaper, offers a surprisingly fine interpretation of Murray's silent desperation. Once a successful restaurant owner, this sixtysomething man is now reduced to flirting with a widowed sugar mama (Jessica Walter) to scrounge up some extra cash. When cousin Rita (a delightfully zonked Marisa Tomei, in her first good role in ages) shows up at their doorstep after escaping from a detox clinic, "Slums" truly shifts into high gear, as the Abromovitzs go to great lengths to try to keep Rita clean and sober, the better to use her to squeeze a generous allowance out of rich Uncle Mickey (Carl Reiner) and Aunt Belle (Rita Moreno). Meanwhile, Vivian has her hands full trying to resolve her relationship with Eliot (Kevin Corrigan), a pot-dealing Charles Manson admirer who nevertheless wins her heart. Not all of "Slums" works: Jenkins overplays her hand with an ill-advised scene between Murray and Rita, and some of the scenes depicting Vivian's sexual awakening would seem crass were it not for Lyonne's presence. But it's rare to find a comedy with so many memorably etched characters and rarer still to come across a movie set in the 1970s that doesn't continually beat you over the head with goofy period relics. By the end of "Slums," you'll want to know more about the Abromovitzs, and any film that makes you actually hope for a sequel must be pretty good. James Sanford
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews