(A pizza joint with a waitress who looks like Julia Roberts - only in a movie would that shit go down...)
CAST: Annabeth Gish, Julia Roberts, Lili Taylor, Vincent D'Onofrio, Adam Storke, William R. Moses, Conchata Ferrel, Joanna Merlin.
DIRECTOR: Donald Petrie
WARNING: Some SPOILERS and super-saucy chicks schlepping super-secret pizza sauces - straight ahead.
I remember the first time I saw MYSTIC PIZZA in 1988. I hadn't heard much about it and figured it couldn't be so bad if it was about one of my favorite things on Earth: pizza. Besides - the poster featured some really good-lookin' folks, among them a then-unknown chick named... Julia Roberts. Surely, watching MYSTIC PIZZA would just be a little bit better than spending two hours at the local video arcade getting my ass spanked by the security guard. Draw your own conclusions.
Anyhow our latest food flick revolves around the title pizza parlor in Mystic, Connecticut. From the looks of it, Mystic is peopled with: (1) Portuguese-American fishermen, (2) Portuguese-American fisherwomen, (3) their slutty/rowdy/nerdy offspring, (4) rich WASP douchebags, and (5) their Porsche-driving douchebag offspring. In other words, it's your usual mix of haves and have-nots. Only the have-nots smell like lobster.
Our three heroines are waitresses at the local pizza joint. It's the summer after high school graduation - that special time between being a kid and being an adult. They are a trio of slutty/rowdy/nerdy Portuguese-American fishermen offspring. Allow me to introduce: (1) Daisy (Julia Roberts), slutty waitress who is permanently eye-fucking anything with pants; (2) Jojo (Lili Taylor), rowdy waitress who has commitment issues but absolutely no sex issues, meaning she's basically a dude in a chick's body; and (3) Kat (Annabeth Gish), nerdy waitress who cannot wait to leave Mystic in her rearview mirror when she starts attending Yale in the fall.
Acting as a "Tough Love" den mother to these chicks is Leona (Conchata Ferrell), owner of the pizza parlor and the creator of the "Mystic Pizza." Evidently named as such because of its wondrous taste, the pizza is so legendary I wouldn't be surprised if it caused spontaneous orgasms in the local populace. Leona apparently has some secret ingredient in the sauce that she refuses to divulge even to her three surrogate daughters. Hopefully, it's not cannabis attiva because, while that would indeed give the sauce a "mystic" flavor and actually encourage the customers to eat more of it (read: munchies), it is also illegal. Isn't it?
Whatever. The bottom line is that Leona ain't coughing up her secrets anytime soon. To keep their minds off this mystery, our three lovely Portuguese-American heroines occupy themselves with another type of food, which is another one of my favorites: sausage. A-hem. Or, if I'm in a vegetarian mood, zucchini. Double A-hem. And while Italian sausage and zuchinni are unquestionably the best, our ladies are settling for Portuguese-American, WASP, and Yuppie Architect sausage and zuchinni.
Oh, goddamnit, people! Work with me here! I'm talking about SCHLONGS! Yes, our heroines each kick off hot and heavy fuck-a-thons right on cue: (1) Daisy meets a rich jack-ass named Charles (Adam Storke), who looks like a buff Jodie Foster; (2) Jojo continues to play cat and mouse with her fisherman fiancee, Bill (Vincent D'Onofrio); and (3) Kat starts baby-sitting for a married yuppie architect named Tim (William R. Moses) - and almost immediately also starts fucking his brains out.
Hmmmmm... maybe the adjective "slutty" should be used for all three of them - and not just Daisy.
Anyway, the bulk of the film chronicles the rest of that eventful summer. Will Daisy be accepted by Charlie's rich and snobby WASP parents? Is Charlie just slumming with her to piss them off? Or will Daisy realize she is fucking a buff Jodie Foster and freak out? Why is Jojo so afraid of commitment? Will Bill be able to convince her to open her heart to him? Or will she do the "Runaway Bride" thing again? Will Kat's affair with her married (duh, girl) and older (double duh, girl) lover end badly (triple duh, girl)? Or will he leave his wife (ha ha, right) and ride off with her into the sunset? And - most importantly - is that bitch Leona ever going to tell them what the fuck is in that pizza sauce? Or are our three heroines going to have to beat it out of her?
Go forth and find out. Meanwhile, I'm going to try and not be creeped out by the fact that, in this movie, Julia Roberts looks eerily like a cross between Sean Young and my sister. Wow.
BUT, SERIOUSLY: Light, sweet, charming, and thoroughly entertaining, MYSTIC PIZZA isn't exactly a byzantinely-plotted film. It's just a nice relationship piece centered squarely on a trio of likable girls - and very loosely on food. One might argue that this isn't a true food flick, but I think the pizza parlor (and its mystery sauce) recur enough in the plot to keep us just a little hungry. At least, I was.
This is one of Julia Roberts' early flicks, and was released a couple of years before she exploded with PRETTY WOMAN. Even here, you can see the "X Factor" bubbling inside her. Whenever she's onscreen, no one else stands a chance. It also helps that she's been given a character that plays to her strengths: a fiery surface concealing a tender soul, a brash mouth hiding deep sensitivity. In fact, Daisy reminds me of a young Erin Brockovich - a role which would nab Roberts an Academy Award for Best Actress nearly 13 years later. Watching her here looks like practice for later on. As with Erin in ERIN BROCKOVICH, Daisy Abbruzzo is a firecracker with heart - and Julia Roberts steals the movie with her portrayal.
As Daisy's much more intellectual (but not necessarily more intelligent) sister, Kat, Annabeth Gish is a picture of low-key perfection. Sensing that Roberts has the much more showy role, Gish wisely underplays Kat's personality without making her disappear in proximity to Roberts' explosive charisma. The fact that Gish holds her own without challenging Roberts' presence is remarkable, and is a testament to Gish's talent. Also, she succeeds in making Kat endlessly sympathetic, even as she makes decisions that we know will only hurt her badly in the long run. Without telegraphing, Gish ably communicates that Kat is one of those girls who's played it safe all her life - and her affair with the married Tim releases her, for once.
Lili Taylor gets a nice, rambunctiously quirky showcase as Jojo. Her "who's-chasing-who?" relationship with Bill is one of MYSTIC PIZZA'S highlights. Bill as played by Vincent D'Onofrio is such a great and down to earth guy that you can't help but wish Jojo would just get over her fears and just take that leap of faith with him. People do it every day, kid. Taylor makes Jojo's apprehension towards commitment and wavering conviction funny to watch, and she brings her trademark relatability to the role. And, yes, she and D'Onofrio have a good chemistry.
As for the other two men of the plot, both Adam Storke and William R. Moses provide vivid characterizations of, respectively: (1) Charlie, a rich kid who - like the far less wealthy Daisy - is decent inside but is also insecure and lost, and therefore acts out in ways that are destructive; and (2) Tim, another guy who is decent and lost, who begins an affair with the much younger Kat to, I suppose, recapture his youth. Both actors make their characters layered and complex, and while both eventually do behave badly, they retain our sympathies.
The supporting cast is rounded out by: (1) Conchata Ferrell as Leona, who is like a rock-solid surrogate mother for the three heroines; and (2) Joanna Merlin, as Daisy and Kat's exasperated mother whose clashes with Daisy eventually give way to hidden tenderness and understanding. Both women do their roles justice.
Bottom line: MYSTIC PIZZA is like a good slice of pizza. It's warm, tasty, not too filling, and leaves a slight smile on your face. Plus, if you ever wanted to see Julia Roberts before PRETTY WOMAN launched her into the stratosphere, she's in fine form here - literally and figuratively.
