INTERMISSION: My Perfect Teen Flick
Not that anybody ever will but if you asked me to make a list of essential features for a really good teen movie, it would go something like this:
Teenagers of indeterminate age. They could be 50 years old olds with a quiff and a fetching jumper but they’re still a teenager for the purposes of the film.
At least one person performing a rock and roll song. If it’s a ballad, and it’s pointedly about another character in the film, even better. If someone is sitting on a beach performing with an acoustic guitar (or an unplugged electric) and somehow the song is a full band performance, that’s knocking it out the park stuff.
A car. A hotrod of some sort is best, but any will do. Kids gotta drive.
A monster of some sort. Now, I have a bit of a sliding scale on this one but really, I’m not as fussy as it makes me sound. Absolutely top tier is a rubber monster of some variety, obviously. Beyond that though? I will absolutely take an animal of some sort with some genetically impossible traits and/or stock footage, that’s great also. But let’s be honest here, it’s perfectly valid for the monster to be the local sheriff or someone’s square dad who just isn’t hip to the thing the kids are into these days. I mean, it’s probably not going to be anywhere near as good as a rubber monster but it’s still good. We all know humans can be monstrous, right? It’s fine.
A dance scene. It can be at a beach, at the local cafe or grooving hot spot that’s very in right now, at a school, at a swimming pool, anywhere. If it’s not there though, sure I’m not going to look down on a film for it but I am going to be sad it isn’t there because it could be wonderful.
That’s it, really. I wouldn’t want to put too many restrictions on anything, you know? But definitely, definitely, definitely, the more of these a single film can squeeze in, the more I’m going to be down for it. Sure, it’s by a marginal amount because I’m not that fussy but you (never) asked.