‘Smooth Talk’: 1985’s Bittersweet Coming of Age Story Remains Resonant in 2020

“Smooth Talk,” directed by Joyce Chopra, was recently revived with a restoration at this year’s New York Film Festival. The film was originally released in 1985, but it deserves to be revisited in 2020. Based on the short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” by Joyce Carol Oates, the film follows Laura Dern as Connie, a 15 year old whose flirtatious nature alienates her from her family. This family oriented drama eventually transitions into the genre of suspense, as a sinister stranger named Arnold Friend (Treat Williams) shows up at Connie’s house while she’s home alone. With Laura Dern’s multifaceted performance at its forefront, “Smooth Talk” is a realistic portrait of family dynamics and a compelling look at the expectations imposed upon teenage girls as they come of age.

The summer before her sophomore year of high school, Connie spends her time with her best friends Laura (Margaret Welsh) and Jill (Sara Inglis), seeking male attention at the mall or a popular drive-in restaurant. Meanwhile, Connie’s mother (Mary Kay Place) thinks her daughter is headed down the wrong path, and openly prefers Connie’s eager-to-please, “good girl” older sister June (Elizabeth Berrdige). It’s a story that’s been told countless times — a teenage girl’s exploration of her sexuality creates tension in her family — but it’s executed with a sense of authenticity that is not always present in coming of age movies.

While some aspects of the film are exaggerated, like the “good girl/”bad girl” contrast between Connie and her sister, Chopra still creates palpable friction between the family members. June has a penchant for sitting at home and sewing, which is a bit unrealistic, but she’s nonetheless an effective foil to Connie. The most strained relationship in the family is between Connie and her mother, who lends nuance to a well intentioned but unsympathetic matriarch. “I look at you. I look right in your eyes, and all I see are a bunch of trashy daydreams,” is one of her first lines to Connie in the movie. These unnecessarily cruel remarks to her daughter are frequent, and Place delivers them with just enough biting snark.

A young Laura Dern gives an impressive performance that holds the film together, shining through the strong actors supporting her. Dern only just won her first Academy Award in 2020 for her role in “Marriage Story,” but the talent that earned her this recognition is perceptible decades earlier in “Smooth Talk,” when Dern was just a teenager. Her portrayal of Connie is both engaging and relatable; while Connie is written as a girl whose main interest is seeking male attention, Dern accesses a depth beyond this singularity. She wants to maintain a tough exterior — especially in front of her mother — but Dern gradually exposes her character’s vulnerability, showing off an extensive emotional range in Connie’s moments of insecurity.

In the final third of “Smooth Talk,” the film shifts dramatically in tone. A grown man named Arnold Friend shows up at Connie’s house while the rest of the family is out. He tries to coax her into going for a drive with him, and it’s revealed that he’s been stalking her; he knows a frightening amount of information about Connie and her friends and family. He’s convinced they’re meant to be together and will stop at nothing to get her to leave with him. Connie spent the summer wanting boys to be attracted to her. What does she do now that the wrong person is fixated on her? Throughout the film, screenwriter Tom Cole carefully alternates between showing the attention Connie desires (or thinks she does), and the completely undesired attention that goes along with her growing up in a misogynistic world. In one scene, she playfully flirts with a boy who just graduated from her high school, and in another, a group of men in a car harass her and throw cans at her as she walks home. In this way, “Smooth Talk” provides thoughtful commentary on the bittersweet duality of what it means to be a girl coming of age in a patriarchal society.

With Arnold Friend, Connie is reminded all at once how young she really is, and Dern captures her fear and naivete perfectly in this final sequence of the film. Connie’s character development reflects her traumatizing experience with him; by the end of the film, her loss of innocence has changed her, and Dern depicts this evolution with just the right amount of subtlety. In the final scene, “Handy Man” by James Taylor, which is a favorite song of her family, plays; “I fix broken hearts, I know I really can,” he sings. As Connie dances with her sister to the song, “Smooth Talk” shows us all the ways our hearts can be broken — but it also reminds us that they aren’t necessarily irreparable.

—Staff writer Jaden S. Thompson can be reached at jaden.thompson@thecrimson.com