Hauptsache Beverly Hills

i'm not quite sure exactly why i like this film but as the credits rolled i was smiling nonetheless. the orange/brown/pea-soup green 70's setting of it was one of the things i found authentic and quirky about it. the whole texture of the movies seems saturated by that awful color scheme, as though the whole world is being invaded and lorded over by kitsch. another more base reason is the infinitely watchable natasha lyonne as the blossomed teenager coping with an increasingly unstable world. first her family life and now even her body seem to follow wild and unpredictable spurts. she is obviously quite attractive and i would say the best actor/actress to come out of the American pie bunch and thus not surprisingly the most overlooked. the characters all seem believable to the point that one has to understand that some biographical elements are playing heavily into the story. that said brings to mind the old adage that truth is often stranger than fiction, and in this case it also is more entertaining.

7 out of 10

Being 17 in 1976, this movie perfectly captured that era's tackiness and lack of direction. It hurt just to look at the clothes and listen to the music.

I found the movie a perfectly realistic change from the overwrought seriousness and cookie-cutter "family" pieces.

I especially liked the dead cat, Rita's "boyfriend", and "It's a building thing."

Evocative, scary [in a PVC-upholstered sofa sort of way], redeeming, honest -- I was laughing through my tears.

The Slums of Beverly Hills is a coming-of-age story from the perspective of a young girl. Vivian, the protagonist, is the pubescent member of a roving band of urban gypsies in 1976 Beverly Hills. The band consists solely of her divorcee father, and two brothers; one older and one younger. They don't roam far, just in the confines of the Beverly Hills school district. They are joined by a rehab-fleeing, neurotic female cousin, who becomes a guide for the young Vivian, leading her through the sexual-emotional vicissitudes of teenagerdom. Very clever, and also very heartfelt, The Slums of Beverly Hills really connected with me. I felt for the family. The acting is top flight and this makes up for some grating story lapses. When in the mood for a comedy I highly recommend this movie.

THE SLUMS OF BEVERLY HILLS (3 outta 5 stars) I figured this was going to be just another silly movie about the trials and tribulations of spoiled rich kids in Cali. Actually it's a pretty good coming-of-age story circa 1976. Vivian (Natasha Lyonne) has just grown breasts and now considers herself deformed. Her dad (Alan Arkin) is a divorced man of almost-retirement-age who has never been able to provide a stable home for his kids and keep dragging them from place to place like nomads (and presumably keeping one step ahead of bill collectors). One brother is a struggling actor and the other is too young to really fit in anywhere. In a desperate attempt to make ends meet Arkin takes in his troubled 29 year old niece (Marisa Tomei), charging his rich brother a fee for keeping an eye on her. So they all move into a small, cheap Beverly Hills apartment block and try to cope. Very funny moments... punctuated by some heavy drama and some unexpected twists. One of the better roles that Alan Arkin had had in recent years... proving that he hasn't lost his touch as he's gotten older (unlike many other comic actors of his generation). I have never been much of a fan of Marisa Tomei but I liked her a lot in this movie. The scenes of her and Lyonne conversing in their "secret language" are priceless!

This is a Jewish movie with the missing mom being a really key component. In the scene with Viv looking at the remote figure of the mom with two daughters as they leave to go shopping -- even (or especially) this mom who says big breasts are out of date, and who has provided her daughter with a nose job -- there is clear yearning for and respect for a mother. And in the responsibilities Viv is given and which she takes pretty courageously i'd say, she is a little mother to her family. Cousin Rita Abramovitz, on the other hand, is a female disaster, and Marisa Tomei's performance is spot on. Again, not comic. Human feeling and weakness showing through veneer of sexual energy. Our culture provides for sex first. Sex sells. There's a temporary sense of power, but this is not what people are. And Tomei gets that across. She disentigrates into illness. Elliott the pot dealer is drawn with accuracy and tenderness, recalling people i knew back then and illuminating them for me. The scene that was key for me in this motion picture is the father at his restaurant(with hair on his head in a lovely flashback)dealing with his cook. The meat. Could move the setting from Beverly Hills to the LaBrea tarpits . . . watching living creatures thrash and sink in the black goo of materialism.