Linda Blair has some pretty interesting things to say in the peculiar features that accompany Arrows DVD re-release of 1984s Savage Streets. She talks about her all-time favorite tune and the lack of roles for strong women at the sentence the picture was made, but perchance the most telling fact that she unveils is that there was a lengthy work stoppage during shooting. The movie ran out of support in 1983 and its completion looked like a dim prospect until John Strong took on the producing role. According to Blair the increase of Strongs strong hand was what made Savage Streets the cult smash that it became. What were John Strongs contributions to this exploitation watershed (besides his porntastic nom-de-smut )?A single pass through Savage Streets will probably tip you to his work or at least reveal a dividing line between the pre and post work stoppage material.
Savage Streets follows two groups of neer do well youth who visit the squalid streets of Hollywood their home. The Scars are a quartette of drug dealing drop-outs who are always spoiling for a fight and sail the boulevard looking for debtors to get down and girls to defile. The Satins on the other hand are a lot of tough girls who appear to prefer shopping to mayhem but never back down from a challenge. Brenda (Blair) is the leader of the Satins and she and her girls are cruising the Ave.one night along with Brendas deaf-mute sister Heather. Heather (Linnea Quiggley) is as pure as the day is tenacious and her sister works to protect that virtue with everything she has.On this fateful evening Heather is almost run over by the Scars and subsequently a heated exchange between the two groups Brenda decides they should buy the Scars car and go for a joyride.
But Brendas carefree bear poking comes second to haunt Heather, who the Scars track down at her high school in the San Fernando Valley. While Brenda is off fighting in the shower Heather is dragged into a bath and gang raped by the 4 savage sad sacks.Heather ends her ordeal in a coma and Brenda vows to attempt out and penalize the offending culprits.
My first impulse, based only on 25 year nostalgia, is to say Savage Fuckin Streets, Fuck Yeah! But my inner 15 year old, fun as he may be, fails to describe for time, consistency, or performance issues so long as the 3 Bs make an appearance(beaver, blood and boobs).Thats a great aesthetic for a pump-minder at a kegger,not such a large set of criteria for a movie reviewer. Still Savage Streets, while mostly focused on the 3 Bs has some other interesting aspects, both serious and bad, that hit it an above average exploitation picture.
The most jarring moments in this picture are without question during Linnea Quigley rape scene. The shot is so out of pace with the quippy, stock characterizations that inhabit the stay of the movie that it adversely affects the titillating shower hijinks and the Linda Blair bathtub sequences. Yes this is an exploitation movie and it is not at all shocking that assault is used to motivate action, but this is a job of smell and style. For one brutal sequence it seems like the producers brought in a visiting auteur to help see the sin of sexual assault with little restraint. The answer is that by movies end I felt like I had just watched a reimagining of Soil with gang rape in it.
It is a will to the ideas and talents of everyone involved that this barbarous scene and the tonal dissonance it creates doesnt stop Savage Streets from being a highly re-visitable piece of vintage American sleaze.Linda Blair is a welcome zaftig reminder of a sentence when the average pervert had tastes for a more womanly, curvaceous variety of B-movie minx. The supporting cast is hit and lack but the bad guys grind up scenery like a crowd of brontosaurus and John Vernon dishes out the channel of the picture during his 5 minutes of screen time. All of this helps draw the viewer awayfrom that grimy instance of sexual violence to a province of head that allows a sensible investment in Brendas revenge. To force things still further towards fun the soundtrack is an unfiltered blast of Survivor styled mid-80s nad-rock and when those glorious John Parr-gone-too-far tunes arent on showing a very effective, tension-filled score takes their place.
Savage Streets is better than it should be, not totally deserving of its classic reputation, momentarily ethereal, sporadically disturbing, and seldom boring. Will it go for you? Who loves? All I know is that Linda Blair is hot, the revenge is cold, and the violence occasionally feels like a fat right-cross after a sweet soft kiss. In my word that makes this film one slimy, pitch-shifting oldie thats worth a look. Keep in judgement that at least partially of this feeling is informed by my inner 15 year old, who right now is stressful to get me to go and looking up nude pics of Linda Blair online.
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