Fast Times at Ridgemont High
Director: Amy Heckerling
Year Released: 1982
Rating: 3.0
Good-natured and honest look at the lives of horny and/or lonely high school kids as they try to become adults - the plot is threadbare, but the acting is remarkable, with outstanding performances by Sean Penn, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Ray Walston as strict-but-concerned history teacher Mr. Hand. Like Animal House, scenes from this have become a part of our culture, from Phoebe Cates' infamous topless number (and Judge Reinhold's self-pleasure being interrupted by Cates ... a masturbator's worst nightmare) to Penn ordering pizza in class to Cates explaining to Leigh how to perform fellatio on a carrot (yet neglecting to mention the nutritional value of Vitamin A). Heckerling's Clueless revisited the same territory with kids the same age - but from a different social class (here they flip burgers in malls, there they just shop in the malls) - and is just as essential.
