Poison Ivy (1992) New Line/Suspense-Thriller RT: 93 minutes Unrated Version (sexual content, language, some violence) Director: Katt Shea Ruben Screenplay: Andy Ruben and Katt Shea Ruben Music: David Michael Frank Cinematography: Phedon Papamichael Release date: May 29, 1992 (Philadelphia, PA) Cast: Drew Barrymore, Sara Gilbert, Tom Skerritt, Cheryl Ladd. Box Office: $1.8M (US)
Rating: ***
Poison Ivy is the very definition of a guilty pleasure. In this enjoyably trashy Fatal Attraction clone, a Lolita-like teenage seductress upends the lives of a dysfunctional wealthy family. She’s played by Drew Barrymore who just ten years earlier charmed audiences as precocious little sister Gertie in E.T. In the ten years that passed, she blossomed into a jailbait sex symbol trying to restart her career after her wild child phase. She made a few forgettable movies during this time- e.g. Sketch Artist, No Place to Hide- but Poison Ivy is kind of hard to forget. For one thing, it actually got a theatrical release. For another, 17YO Drew is sexy as hell in it. It may not have cleaned up at the box office, but guys (I assume) rented it like crazy when it came out on video later that year. There were never any copies on the shelf at my local West Coast Video.
Barrymore stars as “Ivy”, at least that’s the name given to her by new best friend Sylvie Cooper (Gilbert, Roseanne) when she first introduces her to her father, aging newscaster Darryl (Skerritt, Alien). We never learn Ivy’s real name or anything else about her for that matter. All anybody knows is that she’s a slutty-looking scholarship student who supposedly lives with an aunt. The two girls couldn’t be more different. Ivy is a fearless extrovert who behaves with reckless abandon; Sylvie is a shy introvert with no friends. She’s prone to lying and phoning in bomb threats to her dad’s TV station when she disagrees with one of his editorials.
Ivy, with her leather jacket, tattoos and nose ring, isn’t the kind of friend parents normally approve of. But this girl is intelligent and manipulative. It doesn’t take her long to win the approval of both parents. She openly flirts with Darryl while riding in his car. The mother Georgie (Ladd, Charlie’s Angels), a pill-popping, oxygen-huffing suicidal hypochondriac, takes a liking to Ivy after she fixes her oxygen mask. She even manages to win over Sylvie’s dog. Before anybody knows it, Ivy has moved in and worked her way into their lives. Dad wants to screw her. Mom finds the daughter she wishes she had. Sylvie sees the person she’d like to be (Ivy clearly represents Sylvie’s id). This makes them blind to Ivy’s actual intentions, none of which are any good.
Katt Shea Ruben is no stranger to sleazy potboilers with titles like Stripped to Kill and Streets to her credit. Not that Poison Ivy is sleazy. It’s more like one of those sexy softcore thrillers that used to air on Cinemax in the wee hours of the morning. Well, maybe not exactly like. Despite the lurid subject matter, Ruben tries to keep it classy. To wit, its existence doesn’t solely rest on sex scenes. There’s very little actual sex. She wants to make a legit psychological thriller about a disturbed lonely teenage girl who latches on to a family with the intention of making it her own. Ivy doesn’t boil bunnies or kill those who get in her way; she’s more of a manipulator, an expert mind game player adept at getting what she wants. Ivy is a classic sociopath. In a way, she’s more dangerous than some knife-wielding psychopath.
Barrymore does tremendous work as Ivy even if her character goes underdeveloped. Of course, that could very well be intentional on the part of the director (Ruben also co-wrote the screenplay). By not knowing her background or real name, it adds an element of mystery. We have no idea who she is, what she’s done and what she’s capable of. It makes Ivy scarier, don’t you think? Gilbert is also good as Sylvie, a dark-edged, literate teen loner whose interior dialogue (heard in voiceover) includes such observations as “lips are supposed to be the perfect reflection of a woman’s anatomy”. She follows that with “Not that I’m a lesbian. Well, maybe I am.” She’s actually the more interesting character in Poison Ivy. Sure, Ivy is hot as hell but Sylvie makes a better conversationalist. The two have decent chemistry; you can see why Sylvie is attracted to Ivy.
Earlier I described Poison Ivy as “trashy”. I think I need to qualify that description. It’s not trashy in the same way as The Lonely Lady, Angel or Stripped to Kill. It’s trashy in the sense that it’s yet another Fatal Attraction/Hand That Rocks the Cradle clone about an interloper causing upheaval in a family’s life. Stylistically, it hits all the right points with the rainy nights, lightning flashes and attempts by the antagonist to make the protagonist look like a liar and/or a crazy person. The score and cinematography are right out of a Hitchcock thriller. The thing is there’s no genuine suspense in Poison Ivy. It’s actually rather silly but no sillier than any other stranger-from-hell thriller.
When all is said and done, Poison Ivy is a reasonably entertaining B-level thriller. It’s a big step up for Ruben in that it’s not meant for the grindhouse circuit. It doesn’t work perfectly. There’s no real sense of menace on Barrymore’s part. She lies, seduces and manipulates, but I don’t see a killer instinct. Ladd’s performance is of the Camille School of Acting. It’s almost laughable at times. However, it works just well enough to make it worth watching.
