LESS THAN ZERO. Directed by Marek Kanievska; written by Harley Peyton; produced by Jon Avnet and Jordan Kerner. Starring Andrew McCarthy, Jami Gertz and Robert Downey, Jr. Rated R (language, explicit sex).
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Living in California, at least if you're also incredibly rich, can be hazardous to your health. That's the message of Less Than Zero, at any rate. The characters who are able to head east, either to school or to follow boyfriends, end up surviving, while the others don't do so well.
If the preceding sounds a little simple-minded, well, Less Than Zero is a pretty simple-minded movie. Something of a morality play on the evils of drug use, it undercuts its own message by implying that Beverly Hills is the only place such things are available. Get out of town, and everything will be cool.
It also makes its characters almost impossible to identify with. They are so much wealthier—and I mean by several orders of magnitude—than 99 percent of the movie audience. The glitzy, thrill-seeking lifestyle this wealth makes possible doesn't have much in common with that of your typical high school grad.
The movie focuses on three friende who graduated six months before. Clay (McCarthy) has been in college (safe "back east" somewhere) and is home for the holiday. Blair (Gertz), who models, and Julian (Downey), who would like to wheel and deal but who mostly just gets wired and goes to clubs, have stayed in L.A.
Julian is obviously headed for self-destruction. He borrows and loses money at a frightening pace on various ill-considered schemes. He has alienated his family, and has pushed his body to its limit of endurance with cocaine.
Blair is worried about him but needs to be concerned with herself a bit, too. She'a not quite so strung out, but may find herself that way soon if she keeps snorting coke at every opportunity.
Clay is the level-headed one. Not a drug user in high school apparently, he's also stayed clean at college (oh, but I forget; cocaine isn't aviilable on the east coast). But we can only guess at where he gets his common sense. His family life is just as dismally non-existent as that of his friends. (In fact, Julian's father's rejection of him is actually the most parent-like behavior we see in Less Than Zero.) And Clay, like the others, certainly I has enough money to indulge in whatever vices take his fancy.
The three actors, aside from looking a bit older than 18, do a good job in their roles. Downey gets to chew the most scenery, but McCarthy also exhibits some depth beneath his cool exterior. Gertz gets Blair's insecurity about herself and her situation just right. Although I found it a little disconcerting that she has a different hairstyle for practically every scene in the movie. Less Than Zero would be good to see if you need some ideas about what to do with medium length hair.
Perhaps I enjoy being perverse in the face of a movie with a moral, but my favorite character in Less Than Zero is Rip (James Spader), the drug pusher. Spader has played slimily obnoxious rich kids before (in Pretty in Pink, for one). And his efforts in another current release, Baby Boom, show a new subtlety in his characterization of unpleasant people. But with Rip he graduates to full-fledged nasty and he's really good. He could well be the man we love to hate well into the 21st century if he keeps this up.
Less Than Zero' s sermon about the perils of drug use is pretty harrowing, in part because of Downey's good performance, but also because of his make-up crew. He looks downright disgusting by the end of the movie—a terrible fate befall one of the beautiful people. (The most oft-uttered line in the movie is "You look great," the "How are you?" of the 80s, it would seem.)
If you're thinking that I'm not taking this very earnest movie too seriously, then you're right. It has flashy cinematography that's interesting to watch, and good acting. But it's a fairy tale, with little connection to real life that I can see. Now I don't mind movies like that at all, if they're honest about it. Less Than Zero, however, pretends to be realism. But its reality looks nothing like mine.
November 25, 1987