Gen X Ruminations: Love Stinks
We can’t say we weren’t warned. As early as 1980 the J. Geils Band put all of us on notice that our pursuit of love could easily result in heartbreak but that was hardly the only message delivered to teenage boys in the 80s. Again, much of it comes back to cable TV. Long before Kim Cattrall mastered Sex in the City, she revealed a lusty side of the 1950s that was never depicted on Happy Days. For Gen X, Porky’s defined the image of the teenage boy desperately struggling to get laid for the first time and all the ridiculous pratfalls that would subject the young protagonist to an endless series of cock blocks. The film would have been forgotten within three months of release had it not been for cable, which seemed to feature it daily between 1981 and 1983. It was followed by the good, the bad, and the ugly when it came to the swelling urges of young love or, at the very least, lust. There were the anonymous vixens/exercise advocates of Aerobicise to get the blood pumping and a dynamic team of women who endowed ZZ Top’s videos with such visual appeal that we were more than willing to overlook the fact that the band was older than many of our parents.
As straight guys, my friends and I fell in love with the beautiful-yet-approachable Elizabeth Shue as she flipped up the collar of her Polo shirt and cheered on the new (karate) kid in town. Phoebe Cates had us all wishing that we attended Ridgemont High and Sherilyn Fenn was never more seductive than when she pined for a mysterious Charlie Sheen in The Wraith. (A film that really was rather entertaining. Yeah, a Charlie Sheen film — and not Platoon — that was worth the ticket price.) And, of course, I couldn’t write this without blowing a kiss to everyone’s beloved Valley Girl, Deborah Foreman. Could she really break out of her scene and end up with a guy like Nicholas Cage (pre-dental work)? Yes… Yes, she could.
But if we’re really going to talk about 80’s love, I’ve got mention a name that many of you may not know or recall. Let’s all raise a glass of Michelob to Ms. Diane Franklin. As a French foreign exchange student, she gave John Cusack a reason to live in Better Off Dead… But, earlier in the decade, she starred in a film that broke the hearts of all who watched it, guys and gals alike. The movie was called The Last American Virgin and, initially, it seemed as though it would be Porky’s greatest competitor in the “gotta get laid” genre. Indeed, the first half of the film sets itself up nicely for this distinction as it follows a hapless group of teenage guys who suffer a variety of ups and downs in their quest for sex. (And it taught all of us that, no matter how chlorinated the water, soaking in a pool will not relieve crabs. Duly noted.)
But somewhere along the line, the film changes in a way that I didn’t see coming. Simply put, it got real. Gary, the main character in the film, becomes entirely smitten with a new girl, Karen, played by the beautiful Diane Franklin. Anyone watching knows that this is a train wreck in the making and Karen will never take Gary seriously. That, in itself, could be enough of a life lesson to carry the film, but thankfully the story becomes more complex than what I would have expected from the usual formula. Those of you who’ve seen the film know what’s coming. Karen, of course, falls for Gary’s friend who’s better looking and exudes the danger pheromone that no self-respecting teenage girl could resist. So, she sleeps with him and the result is an unwanted pregnancy. This is Gary’s opportunity, or so he thinks. (It would be another decade before Dumb and Dumber would immortalize the phrase, “So you’re saying there’s a chance.”)
Skip to the heartbreak heard across suburban America, thanks to that damn cable box: Gary holds Karen’s hand throughout the process of securing an abortion and terminating the pregnancy. He scrapes up the cash to pay for the procedure and comforts her every step of the way, convinced that this will undoubtedly prove his love. And it did — at least to those of us watching. But, in the end, they were both just kids. The film ends with Gary arriving at Karen’s birthday party only to find…wait for it…Karen making out with the very bad boy who had previously impregnated/dumped her.
“Thud!” That was the punch I felt in my stomach as the film ends with Gary crying as he drives home. Damn, love really does stink. How strange it is to think back to your first experience with heartbreak and realize that one, it wasn’t really your heart and, two, it was delivered by cable TV. Nevertheless, one look into the beautiful eyes of a teenaged Diane Franklin and I’d surely be the next “Gary”.
As the 80s came to an end, things got brighter. My acne cleared up…a bit…and Ferris Bueller taught me not to take things so damned seriously. There was a new decade approaching. I would head off to college and face my own chance(s) at heartbreak(s). By 1991, the perfect “everydude” Frank Whaley would show me that, if only in the movies, even an average guy could spend a magical night locked in a Target with a goddess like Jennifer Connelly. There would be Career Opportunities to pursue and now, at my advanced age, I still take time out to pull up the YouTube video of Space Age Love Song — which I once owned on 45 — and dream of roller skating with Jennifer through endless aisles of Chinese-made abundance.
