Higher_HIghs

The biggest secret to me is how Nicolas Cage managed to convince the entire world that he's a "sex symbol". "What a hunk! Look at his pecs!", says one of the girls on the beach as the camera cuts to a young man with literally zero pectoral muscles on him. That young man is Randy - a character played by Cage. Maybe it's some sort of halo effect? Maybe this Randy is just an incredibly handsome man with a chiseled jawline and piercing eyes? No, that's his friend - Fred. Randy is this sleepy-eyed, long-faced, double-chinned, barely 6 feet tall juvenile skinny punk with questionable fashion choices and no prospects in life. But hey, at least unlike his friend he's 6 feet tall. Maybe that's all that matters to young girls, I don't know.

What makes things more interesting is that it was the first major role for Nicolas - effectively his debut on the big screen. So we can't suppose that the producers chose him as their leading actor for his name value. Wait, the budget of the movie was only $350k? Well, that explains a lot. I think he was just the only actor in Hollywood they could find who would agree to work for food.

I can't not mention the parents of the girl our "hunk" Randy falls in love with. It looks like the budget deficit affected not only the casting process of the protagonist - I think they couldn't afford any mature actors at all (the screen time for all actors aged 30+ was kept to a minimum here). Otherwise, how can we explain that Julie's mother looks like her YOUNGER sister, and her father looks like a brother who wears a mustache to... look older, I guess?

Ah, and don't let me start on Julie. She literally bothers to ask her father for life advice just to go the opposite way (and the father really gave solid advice with valid arguments based on his personal experience). He even asks her to tell him her decision once it's made, but we don't see this request being honored in any way, which is weird - why then leave this line in the final edit? How self-insecure must one be to choose a life partner based on who your FRIENDS want you to be with. Anyway, what kind of a twisted character even thinks about putting their personal interests above the feelings of their friends as far as the topic of love is concerned?

But it all doesn't matter, because the picture ended up being a financial success and launched Cage's career to unthinkable heights... and subsequently to unthinkable lows, for that matter. Who knows if Nicolas Cage would have been as much of a household name as he is today if not for the random success of this cheap, second-rate chick flick.

P. S. I think I figured out the secret to the success of "Valley Girl". You see, there is this subplot that has nothing to do with the main story, but nonetheless adds good a 15 minutes to the duration. This secondary storyline is the classic plot in one of the most popular genres in the adult film industry today, which can be categorized as "hot stepmother seduces her stepdaughter's boyfriend". Considering the lack of accessibility to this kind of movie in the '80s, I can easily see every other ticket to this "girl's movie" being bought by teenage boys. I bet the pool and shower scenes were a hot (pun intended) topic for discussion in schools back in those days. Pretty smart move by the producers to keep this absolutely irrelevant piece of the story in the final edit.

Usually, I have at least a distant idea of why this or that film was added to my watchlist. Since "Miller's Crossing" had been chilling on my hard drive for 3 weeks before I finally got around to watching it, I had completely forgotten what this film was about or why I added it to my watchlist in the first place. So my experience was 100% pure, not tainted by any big names attached to the title - especially the Coen brothers. Well, one thing is for sure - moving forward, I won't be remembering the movie with warm feelings because of how frustrating the whole experience was due to the heavy Italian, Irish, and Jewish accents in the film. I haven't relied so heavily on subtitles since "Peaky Blinders". It took me back to 10 years ago when I had just started learning English and had to listen to each sentence three to five times before finally giving up and peeking at the subtitles anyway. It made me feel like I had regressed in my listening skills since I had watched a full-length movie a week before - it really made me feel self-conscious and anxious. Anyway, the first half was rather mid, but the second half picked up the pace and actually overdelivered in some aspects (maybe I just got better at understanding what the characters were saying and thus didn't have to interrupt the natural flow of the story with disruptive replays and humbling returns to subtitles). I love how the last five minutes brought everything together, giving a double meaning to everything that had happened, making you wonder if the main character was actually even smarter than he was given credit for.

P. S. Speaking of the actor (Gabriel Byrne) playing the protagonist in this film. I kid you not, the moment I saw him I thought "WTF Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is doing here?". I was surprised to find out that them looking alike isn't a thing :(