Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1983)

Fast Times at Ridgemont High: 1983, dir. Amy Heckerling. Seen on DVD (Nov. 6).
Fast Times at Ridgemont High finally got back in print on DVD, so I didn’t have any more excuses for never having seen it. That’s right. I had never seen Fast Times at Ridgemont High. My boyfriend had That Look that he gave me earlier in the year when I found out I had never seen Caddyshack, so the movie went to the top of our rental list and we got it immediately after the new DVD released. We had this beautiful shiny new DVD from Netflix that we may have been the first people to watch.
I don’t know why I had never seen Fast Times at Ridgemont High, except that I was too young to see an R-rated movie when it first came out in theaters. I don’t know why I didn’t include it in the paper I wrote on teen melodrama for a graduate film class—either it must have seemed like too much of a broad comedy or else it was entirely off my radar. I’ve seen scenes from the movie, and mostly what I knew about was Sean Penn as Spicoli, and that it was directed by Amy Heckerling.
(I used to keep close track of movies directed by women, back in the day. I ought to do that again … I noticed all the movies starting to be nominated for awards for 2004 and realized that women are entirely missing from the director and screenwriting lists, and the acting roles didn’t look that choice either. Greeeeat.)

I liked Fast Times at Ridgemont High a lot better than Caddyshack, although it’s not a movie I would buy on DVD or run out to see in a theater or anything. I would, however, like to read Cameron Crowe’s source material, and I ought to see if the book is available at the library. Maybe it would be fine Christmastime reading.
It is very weird to watch the cast, so many years after the movie was made. Jennifer Jason Leigh looks like a kid. She was a kid. I completely forgot she’d ever been that young. Once I looked up her filmography, I realized I’d seen the movie about anorexia she starred in (I think we actually had to watch it for a class), but I didn’t connect that movie later with the actress I saw in The Hudsucker Proxy and Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle, the movies she’s been in that I have particularly enjoyed.
Most of the actors look like they’re the right ages for the parts, with the notable exception of Judge Reinhold. It actually took me a few minutes to realize he was a student and not a teacher. I don’t know if this is because he naturally looked old for his age, or because his character tended to be the older-brother-mentor type anyway. He seemed weirdly out of place at times.
Fast Times at Ridgemont High is supposed to have this one iconic amazing memorable scene that many of the guys I know always remember fondly, in which Phoebe Cates dives into a swimming pool. It’s a nice scene, but I don’t understand why it’s so memorable. She doesn’t strike me as particularly hot, the scene doesn’t strike me as particularly notable. Maybe you have to be a teenage guy to feel that way about it.
What struck me as amazing was the teenagers’ attitude towards sex. They talk about it, they go and do it, and it’s awfully nonchalant. In particular, the scene with the abortion is truly a surprise because it is not something we have seen often in movies, before or since. A character has an abortion, and she doesn’t regret it, or get overly depressed because of it, or suffer in any way. She has the abortion, and two scenes later, you would never know. She does slow down her sex life afterwards, but that doesn’t seem like a negative thing.
I mean, how often in movies or on TV have you seen women have abortions and then go on normally? Especially teenagers? Wow.
Sean Penn also surprised me. Why has he been in so few comedies since Fast Times at Ridgemont High? He has wonderful comic timing. He annoys the crap out of me in these meaty dramatic roles—I couldn’t stand him even in Sweet and Lowdown—but he was delightful in this movie. It was also delightful to see Ray Walston in a perfect role for him, which reminded me slightly of his role in Kiss Me, Stupid. Cameron Crowe is a big fan of Billy Wilder, so I wonder if any of that was intentional.
Fast Times at Ridgemont High was on my Movie List for 2003 and I was finally able to cross it off. However, it was no chore to see this movie.
I also recommend the commentary track, which is done by Cameron Crowe and Amy Heckerling. I don’t usually like commentary tracks, but this one was entertaining and actually went on beyond the length of the movie. Someone must have realized that Crowe and Heckerling were having such a good time (without too many in-jokes that viewers wouldn’t get) that it would be a shame to cut them off, so there are a few minutes of blank screen afterwards while they wrap it up.
Now I just need to see Dazed and Confused and Say Anything, and then maybe y’all will stop picking on me. Probably not, though.