Tomboy (1985) Crown International/Comedy RT: 91 minutes Rated R (language, nudity) Director: Herb Freed Screenplay: Ben Zelig Music: Michael Lloyd Cinematography: Daniel Yarussi Release date: May 10, 1985 (Philadelphia, PA) Cast: Betsy Russell, Jerry Dinome, Kristi Somers, Richard Erdman, Philip Sterling, Eric Douglas, Paul Gunning, Toby Iland, E. Danny Murphy, Rory Barish, Cynthia Ann Thompson, Dennis Hayden. Box Office: $14.1M (US)
Rating: ***
Crown International Pictures, they’re not known for making prestige pictures. Their output mainly consists of low-budget genre movies that typically played at grindhouses and drive-ins across the country back in the day. In other words, junk. When I think of the now-defunct studio, I think of their T&A flicks- e.g. The Pom Pom Girls, The Van, The Beach Girls, My Tutor and Weekend Pass. They’re the kind of movies teen boys either snuck downstairs to watch after hours while their parents slept or devised elaborate schemes to sneak into at the local cinema. Myself, I did plenty of both. They may not have been great pictures but seeing a dirty R-rated comedy without parental permission was a big victory for a 14YO. I’d even call it a rite of passage.
Although it has plenty of both, I’m not sure if Tomboy qualifies as T&A. It’s less concerned with sex and juvenile hijinks than it is telling the story of a young woman trying to make it in a male-dominated field, namely stock car racing. Female auto mechanic Tommy Boyd (Russell, Avenging Angel), the tomboy (TOMmy BOYd, get it?) of the title, wants to race cars. She’s the best mechanic and the best driver in town. She’s also an aspiring race car designer; she’s designing one of her own using the principles of aeronautics (her dear departed dad was an astronaut). Because Tommy is a girl, she’s not taken seriously. She meets her idol, hunky race car driver Randy Starr (Dinome, Dangerously Close), and discovers he’s a sexist with an ego the size of Mount Rushmore. It doesn’t stop her from getting romantically involved with him. Her engine cools down quickly when he goes too far with his chauvinistic put-downs. She challenges him to a race in order to prove herself. Oh, there’s a big contact riding on the outcome too.
The main subplot centers on Tommy’s bff Seville Ritz (Somers, Hardbodies), a girly-girl and aspiring actress. To begin with, I LOVE that name! It makes her sound like a porn star. When we first meet her, she’s excited about an upcoming audition for a movie or music video, it’s hard to tell which. When she doesn’t get that gig, she makes a doughnut commercial more suited to the Playboy Channel than network TV. In easily the movie’s most surreal sequence, she dances seductively wearing powdered doughnuts on her boobs and saying “Eat it” while a couple of older guys ogle and gape from the sideline. Needless to say, the commercial doesn’t get picked up. Seville decides the best thing to do is get close to a wealthy guy willing to finance her career. Enter Ernie Leeds Jr. (Douglas, Delta Force 3), a cocky rich kid who also happens to be Randy’s backer. Generously described as a piece of slime, this creep hosts parties where he prostitutes hot girls to creepy older guys. A more serious movie would explore the darker aspect of this subplot with Seville descending into degradation and self-destructive behavior upon getting involved with Ernie. Tomboy is NOT that movie. There’s nothing serious about it. Seville’s plot thread is dropped and all but forgotten instead.
I didn’t think much of Tomboy when I saw in ’85, but now I kind of like it in a bizarre, goofy way. Over the years, I learned you can’t measure a cheap exploitation flick by the usual standards. It has to be taken on its own terms which aren’t all that high. HOWEVER, even by the low, LOW standards of Crown International, Tomboy is still pretty terrible. It’s incredibly cheesy and most definitely a product of the 80s. Look at all the montages (yes, plural) set to bad 80s rock music. The title song “Tomboy” ranks right down there with the themes from My Tutor and Weekend Pass. The screenplay (Ben Zelig’s sole credit) is half-assed and direction (Herb Freed of Graduation Day) is piss-poor. Characters like dorky Harold (Iland, The Boys Next Door) are introduced to no avail. With the geeky way he tries to hook up with Tommy and Seville, I think he’s supposed to be the comic relief. His character arc, such as it is, goes nowhere. Tomboy falls flat as a comedy yet it’s still funny albeit for the wrong reasons. Some of the dialogue is hilariously awful. When a town sleaze (Gunning, Hollywood Hot Tubs) says to Tommy, “What would you say to a little f***?”, she replies in kind, “I’d say, good night, little f***.” At once silly and empowering, it’s little touches like this that make Tomboy bearable.
The acting, if measured by normal standards, is subpar. Thankfully, the entire cast appears to realize what kind of movie Tomboy is and adjusts their performances accordingly. Russell is HOT and has a nice body. She gets to show if off a few times. She also has a perky personality that shows in every aspect. And that smile, WOW! Her character isn’t uninteresting just underdeveloped. We know she was close to her father as a little girl and that he died at some point. We’re never told the when and how. That reminds me, we’re never told exactly what she does to make her car special. When we finally see it in action in the climax, there are a bunch of buttons, one of which makes the car spout flames from the rear and go very fast. Okay, whatever. Russell manages to make it work. I like her character a lot. Tommy doesn’t back down EVER. Whether she’s trying to outrun a couple of sleazebags on her motorcycle or boxing with Randy in Ernie’s private gym, she’s really something.
Although her character is badly written, I also like Somers a lot. There’s something endearing about her. She’s a true bright spot in Tomboy. In one scene, she gives Tommy a bottle of special perfume for her vagina. Later, she tries to pay her tab at the garage with several boxes of doughnuts. I swear I’m not making any of this up. I wish more had been dome with Seville Ritz (such a cool name!). Dinome is wooden as Randy while Douglas plays it up as the sleaziest, scuzziest rich kid on the West Coast. BTW, he is the son of Kirk Douglas and the half-brother of Michael. His performance is pure camp. Also, Richard Erdman, best known for playing Sgt. Hoffy in Stalag 17, shows up as Tommy’s boss at the garage. What the hell is he doing in this dopey movie?
Like most movies of its kind, Tomboy is poorly made. It looks cheap and doesn’t contain a single thread of intelligence or artistic integrity. It’s clearly made to play to teen couples too busy making out at the drive-in to notice what’s going down on-screen. Oh, and dummies too. Then again, Crown never aimed very high with their movies. Tomboy is especially empty-headed which only makes me appreciate it even more. I know I shouldn’t like it, but I can’t help myself.
