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Look Who’s Talking
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The
publicity graphic for Amy Heckerling’s Look Who’s Talking show a bright-eyed
baby decked out in dark glasses and a Walkman. Never mind that this image, or
even anything resembling it, doesn’t actually appear in the film; it manages,
nonetheless, to perfectly condense the central fantasy of this strange and
charming movie.
Look Who’s Talking imagines what it
would be like if a baby, in its first months of conscious life both in and out
of the womb, could think articulate thoughts. For Heckerling, this child –
outwardly so unformed and helpless – would be a full-blown cool dude, full of
wise-cracks, ironies and total self-assurance. In other words, an unusual
illustration of Jacques Lacan’s concept of the Mirror Phase!
Hence
the inspired choice of Bruce Willis, the popular star of TV’s Moonlighting (1985-1989), to
provide baby Mikey’s laconic voice-over, which is often hilarious. The film
milks many nice gags from the discrepancy between what Mikey imagines,
omnipotently, that he can do (“Hey, I can drive this car, no worries”), and
what his uncoordinated little body actually does. Lacan again!
The
fantasy of a baby with an adult’s mind enlivens the otherwise rather
conventional romantic comedy love-triangle surrounding it. Mollie (Kirstie
Alley) has become pregnant to a manipulating, egotistical businessman, Albert
(George Segal), for whom she does the accounts.
Left
alone, and resentful about having raise the child by herself, Mollie runs into a
streetwise, salt-of-the-earth cabbie, James (John Travolta, in a wonderful comeback
performance). Mollie resists James’ many attractions, but Mikey knows from the
very start which man he would prefer as a father – and he does his best to have
his opinion recognised.
Look Who’s Talking is full of
insightful observations into child and adult behavior. Sure, in conventional
terms, its narrative lacks a certain forward drive, and the dilemmas of its
characters are not particularly surprising or engaging. But the very
aimlessness of the film is part of its charm. It is the kind of movie in which
what really matters are all the little asides: the jokey references to dozens
of pop songs, movies, television shows and other icons of contemporary popular
culture.
In
fact, viewed from this pop-culture angle, the film becomes a lot more
interesting than it might first appear. Every character in it – and
particularly Mikey – lives through the imaginative coordinates that popular
culture offers.
Mollie
endures pregnancy by humorously comparing the changes in her body to the
extreme physical states shown in horror and porn movies; Travolta gives Mikey
disco dance lessons, in memory of Saturday
Night Fever (1977); Mikey admires the graceful movements of
animated puppets on TV. Even the ideal moment of romantic courtship between
Mollie and James is rendered as two people entertaining an affectionately camp
relation to a melodramatic pop song from the 1950s, “Town Without Pity”.
In
fact, Look Who’s Talking – like many contemporary entertainments – is a
virtual compendium of pop-culture highlights over 30 years, from the Beach Boys
to horror filmmaker David Cronenberg, via Janis Joplin.
In
exploring the ways that people live their everyday lives with the help of
popular culture fantasies, Heckerling often pushes her film way beyond realism
and into the realm of pure cartoon: little sperms argue with each other as they
race for Mollie’s ovary; Albert’s head literally explodes from emotional
pressure.
In
a wonderfully bizarre and extreme joke that audibly disconcerts some of the
audience, Mollie’s voice changes into that of the devil as she calls for a
painkiller in the delivery room – cueing Travolta’s immortal punchline: “Hey,
call in the exorcist!”
This
kind of humor will come as no surprise to those who have a fond memory of Amy
Heckerling’s auspicious and enormously successful 1982 debut, the teen movie Fast Times at Ridgemont High. After
that, Heckerling’s achievement level dipped with two films (Johnny
Dangerously [1984] and National
Lampoon’s European Vacation [1985]), that never quite gelled in their
comedic aim. But Look Who’s Talking is
a welcome return to form for this talented director.
2022 Note: Amy Heckerling’s career has
so far chalked up two enduring classics, Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Clueless (1995), and several other
entirely fascinating movies. The commercially very successful Look Who’s
Talking films (two sequels, Look Who’s Talking Too [1990] directed by
her and Look Who’s Talking Now [1993], followed, as well as, briefly, a
sitcom spin-off, and an announced reboot yet to be made), like her work of the mid
‘80s, have not aged so well. The one-joke conceit struck some sparks in
relation to particular Pop Cinema obsessions of
the time, but the appeal didn’t stick. Still, I will always have this memory to
treasure: during the cozy Melbourne media preview for Look Who’s Talking,
when Mollie compares her breast size to a typical Russ Meyer heroine, the city’s
most conservative film reviewer – whom I later had the pleasure of replacing –
turned grumpily to his equally puzzled companion and cried aloud: “Who’s Russ
Meyer?”
MORE Heckerling: Loser © Adrian Martin March 1990 |
