The American independent film is very bullish these days, as more and more little movies somehow reach realization. Square Dance is an absolutely characteristic example. It’s just the sort of small, finely crafted film that was predictably turned down by the big studios, but it’s pleasing enough to find its own audience.
The subject matter is characteristic, too; like the recent independents Smooth Talk, Desert Bloom, and My American Cousin, this one’s about a girl’s coming of age, and the memorable circumstances surrounding it.
In this case, the girl is Gemma (Winona Ryder), 13 years old and just out on summer break. She leaves the small town of Twilight, Texas, after an argument with her grandfather (Jason Robards), with whom she has lived all her life.
She goes to join her mother (Jane Alexander) in Fort Worth. Mom is – how shall we say this – fun loving, with a powerful thirst for life but without much maturity to handle it. It shapes up to be an interesting summer.
For the most part, it is, although many of the rules of this kind of growing-up story are lazily followed. The biggest curve ball is the girl’s inevitable romance – here it’s a hesitant friendship with an intellectually challenged boy (Rob Lowe).
Director Daniel Petrie, who surveyed similar ground in The Bay Boy, is primarily concerned with the actors, and he gets good work from Ryder and the supporting players. Robards and Alexander seem a bit too much like actors acting; they don’t disappear into their roles the way Ryder does.
Like many independent films, this one has a peculiar pedigree. Alexander and Hill Street Blues actor Charles Haid discovered Alan Hines’ novel, and commissioned him to write the script; then ex-Monkee Michael Nesmith stepped in to help produce it. The final boost came from NBC’s Brandon Tartikoff. The tangled credits alone show how difficult it is to make an offbeat movie in America, if you’re anybody other than Woody Allen.
First published in The Herald, March 21, 1987
I had forgotten this was only Ryder’s second feature, a year before Beetlejuice and two years before Heathers. Lowe’s stardom was established, and this was one of those projects a star takes to prove he can Really Act, for which is was rewarded with a Best Supporting Actor nomination from the Golden Globes. So there.
WHAT A FEELING! 