I was thrilled to come across “Valley Girl” on DVD. I’d previously only seen this movie on an ex-rental VHS tape, circa early 1980s, because “Valley Girl” appears never to have been re-issued on VHS in Australia. As well as being an obvious improvement on the VHS version in technical terms, the DVD has the added attraction of Martha Coolidge’s audio commentary.
Her commentary on this DVD is considerably superior to that of Amy Heckerling and Cameron Crowe on the DVD of “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”, which I found overly casual and less informative (sorry Amy, I still love your films). Although I’d seen “Valley Girl” many times, Coolidge’s commentary gave me a lot more insight into the film. She communicates at a level that the general public can understand, but doesn’t neglect to discuss technical and business factors that importantly influenced the end product. Coolidge’s commentary on “Valley Girl” is collected, engaging, detailed and very informative. The insight she provides into matters such as the work put into the film’s colour scheme, the organisation of the brilliant party scene and the way budgetary constraints determined some aspects of the film is exemplary. Although this film is without doubt an icon of 1980s popular culture, it’s also a remarkable accomplishment in filmmaking more generally: a movie that derives its premise from exploitation film but emerges as a more appealing and ideologically sound piece of youth entertainment than anyone expected of teen movies in that era.
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