Movie Review: The Banger Sisters

The Banger Sisters

When a couple of girlfriends and I decided to see a movie this weekend, we took advantage of the fact that most of the men in our lives had gone to a football game allowing us to see a so-called "chick flick". We opted for The Banger Sisters.

The Banger Sisters - Suzette and Vinnie, as played by Goldie Hawn and Susan Sarandon - were a pair of serious rock 'n' roll groupies in the sixties. But since that time, Vinnie (who insists she now be called by her real name, Lavinia) has distanced herself from the past, married a wealthy lawyer, and had two children. Suzette, however, hasn't changed much at all. When circumstances see her travel from Los Angeles to Phoenix to visit her old friend, she's forced to deal with the pain of being rejected by a woman she still loves, but who all but refuses to remember her past let alone acknowledge it. To add to Suzette's problems, a writer with serious self-esteem issues whom she picked up in a truck stop in the California desert (Harry Plummer, played by Geoffrey Rush) is her only other friend in a strange city.

The premise of The Banger Sisters has real potential, and both Goldie Hawn and Susan Sarandon play their parts ably. But the script is a letdown when a movie that's billed as a comedy isn't all that funny (there are a few hysterical exceptions, but those moments are too few and much too far between). It's a bit of a surprise to see Geoffrey Rush, who usually chooses very serious and dramatic roles, in a movie like this one. The surprise is a pleasant one, however, as Rush brings to life a character with foibles both pathetic and very, very funny.

The Banger Sisters is also missing some little touches that could have had real impact on the movie. For example, photos of the two women in their younger days look nothing like either Hawn or Sarandon. Yet the two have been acting for years and doubtless have available plenty of studio shots that could have (given today's digital technology) been realistically added to the appropriate backgrounds and made us believe the two really did have a history together. And a flashback scene, which could have - and should have! - shown a little rock 'n' roll action instead uses stock footage of 1960's Hollywood streets with no rhyme nor reason that could possibly apply to the memories one of the women is apparently playing back in her head.

Although each of us who attended this showing of The Banger Sisters are too young to remember what the '60's were really like, we were prepared to be nostalgic and to get caught up in the reminisces of two good friends who are thrust back together after having been largely out of touch for years. As it turned out, the movie made us feel neither.

FAMILY SUITABILITY: The Banger Sisters is rated R. There is no real violence and no overt sex, but there is some sexual content and a few instances of strong language. Though there's nothing here the average 15 year-old couldn't easily deal with, given the wink of the screenplay at some of the teen girls' antics, it's probably not a good idea to let your teens see this movie unless you're well prepared to discuss such topics as teen sex, drinking, drug use, and joyriding.