Jeff Daniels is a nice thirtyish young man stuck in a job in finance in New York. He has responsibilities, ambition, but he's bored with office intrigues and his life in general. On an impulse, having lunch alone, he skips out on the check, just to see what it feels like. Outside, a strangely dressed, garishly made-up Melanie Griffith, who calls herself Lulu, catches up with him, threatens to expose his crime, and more or less kidnaps him.
They drive through New Jersey to Pennsylvania, with Lulu flirting, lying, and thieving at every step. Her behavior is confident and outrageous. She handcuffs him to the bed and forces him to lie to his boss over the phone while she ministers to him. She asks him into the bathroom while she's peeing. Daniels begins to enjoy his release a little and they speed along and booze it up on the pastoral highways. When they reach her home town, she introduces him to her mother as her husband. Her mother, played with a great deal of rural charm by Dana Preu, sees through the ruse immediately and flows along with Lulu's fantasy. She also plays a clumsy but sweet minuet by Bach on the living room harpsichord.
It gets worse at Lulu's high school reunion. By this time Lulu has changed her grooming and looks like a square young lady, and Daniels is now shed his Wall Street gear and is decked out in a loud suit and canary yellow tie. There, Daniels runs into someone who works down the hall from him at the office. Gulping with fear, stuttering, Daniels begins to introduce Lulu with some semblance of respectability, but Lulu interrupts -- "I'm his mistress." The co-worker is properly awed because Lulu is nobody's idea of a dog. Lulu goes on, "We're going to get married because of the baby." The co-worker: "You're going to have his child?" Lulu chuckles: "I THINK it's his." She delivers all her lines in a smoothly casual fashion.
It's all been fun and games so far, with Daniels being Apollonian and Lulu being Dionysian, as Nietzsche might have described them. The moderate, rational, formal Daniels being corrupted -- or liberated -- by the ecstatic, drunken, spirited Lulu. By the time of the high school prom, though, they have become something of a blend. So it turns out to be what we always suspected. Daniels was a latent Dionysian -- but better latent than never. (Sorry.) Things turn dark when they run into Lulu's old boyfriend, Ray Liotta, at his most seductively evil.
The comedy never really stops as Liotta takes them on a crime spree but we're now in serious territory because Liotta is like a zit about to pop with rage. He punctures things with his sharp, metal-tipped boots.
It's worth seeing, if only because it's not simply stupid when it's measured against most of the garbage filling today's movie screens. There's a real sense of spiritedness as Daniels and Lulu zip along in their beat-up convertible, guzzling recklessly out of the bottle, and playing reggae on the radio, with Lulu smiling and rhythmically swaying back and forth to the beats, even while she sits behind the wheel. It's all a fantasy, of course, and there is no heavy message involved, unless it's "lighten up a little and try to avoid old boyfriends."
They drive through New Jersey to Pennsylvania, with Lulu flirting, lying, and thieving at every step. Her behavior is confident and outrageous. She handcuffs him to the bed and forces him to lie to his boss over the phone while she ministers to him. She asks him into the bathroom while she's peeing. Daniels begins to enjoy his release a little and they speed along and booze it up on the pastoral highways. When they reach her home town, she introduces him to her mother as her husband. Her mother, played with a great deal of rural charm by Dana Preu, sees through the ruse immediately and flows along with Lulu's fantasy. She also plays a clumsy but sweet minuet by Bach on the living room harpsichord.
It gets worse at Lulu's high school reunion. By this time Lulu has changed her grooming and looks like a square young lady, and Daniels is now shed his Wall Street gear and is decked out in a loud suit and canary yellow tie. There, Daniels runs into someone who works down the hall from him at the office. Gulping with fear, stuttering, Daniels begins to introduce Lulu with some semblance of respectability, but Lulu interrupts -- "I'm his mistress." The co-worker is properly awed because Lulu is nobody's idea of a dog. Lulu goes on, "We're going to get married because of the baby." The co-worker: "You're going to have his child?" Lulu chuckles: "I THINK it's his." She delivers all her lines in a smoothly casual fashion.
It's all been fun and games so far, with Daniels being Apollonian and Lulu being Dionysian, as Nietzsche might have described them. The moderate, rational, formal Daniels being corrupted -- or liberated -- by the ecstatic, drunken, spirited Lulu. By the time of the high school prom, though, they have become something of a blend. So it turns out to be what we always suspected. Daniels was a latent Dionysian -- but better latent than never. (Sorry.) Things turn dark when they run into Lulu's old boyfriend, Ray Liotta, at his most seductively evil.
The comedy never really stops as Liotta takes them on a crime spree but we're now in serious territory because Liotta is like a zit about to pop with rage. He punctures things with his sharp, metal-tipped boots.
It's worth seeing, if only because it's not simply stupid when it's measured against most of the garbage filling today's movie screens. There's a real sense of spiritedness as Daniels and Lulu zip along in their beat-up convertible, guzzling recklessly out of the bottle, and playing reggae on the radio, with Lulu smiling and rhythmically swaying back and forth to the beats, even while she sits behind the wheel. It's all a fantasy, of course, and there is no heavy message involved, unless it's "lighten up a little and try to avoid old boyfriends."