'I woke up in a great mood; I don't know what the hell happened.'
Mike Damone
I don't think I've actually seen Fast Times At Ridgemont High, at least not from start to finish. I've certainly seen bits and pieces from the 1982 Amy Heckerling comedy on television, and scenes on-line. I moved into my teens in the late 80's, and certainly remember malls, especially loving when our parents took us to the huge three story mall. I loved running from the toy stores to the pet stores and the hobby and book stores. Fast Times does a great job of capturing the feel of the era of the mall.
Although I didn't see all of the movie, I certainly was aware of the unique sex appeal of actor Robert Romanus. I think I first saw Romanus in the late eighties on The Facts of Life. The talented actor played Natalie's boyfriend 'Snake'. If I remember correctly, Natalie lost her virginity to Snake in one of The Facts of Life's many issue oriented 'very special episodes.'
In Fast Times, Romanus plays the fast talking know it all Mike Damone. Mike uses his friend Mark (Brian Backer) to get close to Stacy, (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who he ends up having sex with. Stacy ends up pregnant causing issues between both her and Mike, and between Mike and Mark.
I've frequently written about the amount of male nudity we've lost when movies are transferred from VHS to DVD and Blu-ray. In the case of Fast Times At Ridgemont High, that trend is wonderfully reversed. With the recent release of a new 4K digital transfer, supervised by director Amy Heckerling, restores some full-frontal nudity of Robert during his sex scene with Jennifer.
Although the original film featured a topless Phoebe Cates, the full frontal was cut in order to avoid the film getting an 'X' rating. It’s not a brand new scene added back into the film as the theatrical version simply zoomed in to avoid showing off too much of Romanus. The Criterion cut simply restores the original framing.
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