Roger Ebert is one of the most iconic and respected film critics of all time – but it turns out even the best sometimes get it wrong.
In 1982, the beloved comedy Fast Times at Ridgemont High was released, starring Sean Penn, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Phoebe Cates. Directed by Amy Heckerling (who would go on to direct Clueless) in her feature directorial debut, it was based on the book by Cameron Crowe (Almost Famous), who at 22 went undercover at a San Diego high school to obtain the experience he never had; Cameron graduated at age 15.
The film chronicled a year in the life of Stacy Hamilton (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who works at a mall pizzeria with her older best friend Linda Barrett (Phoebe Cates), an ensemble cast of characters including classmates Mark Ratner (Brian Backer) and Mike Damone (Robert Romanus), Penn's Jeff Spicoli, a stoner teenager who fancies himself an expert surfer; history teacher Mr. Hand; and Stacy's older brother Brad, a popular senior.
Roger Ebert's review
Roger's review opens: "How could they do this to Jennifer Jason Leigh? How could they put such a fresh and cheerful person into such a scuz-pit of a movie? Don’tthey know they have a star on their hands? I didn’t even know who Leigh was when I walked into Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and yet I was completely won over by her. She contained so much life and light that she was to behold. And then she and everybody else in this so-called comedy is invited to plunge into offensive vulgarity."
He went on to call the movie "tone-deaf," claiming that it turns what could have been funny situations and instead makes them embarrassing to watch, and suggested that, despite being directed by a woman, it is still "sexist".
"Why does someone as pretty as Leigh have to have her nudity exploited in shots where the only point is to show her ill-at-ease?" the review read.
40 years later
But 46 years on, Fast Times is arguably one of the quintessential teen comedies; in 2005, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
© WireImageIt made stars of Jennifer and Sean, and it is now considered one of the early revolutionaries of the teen film genre, swapping exaggerated caricatures for an authentic look at the realities of what teens were going through at the time, good, bad and ugly.
Realities of 1980s life
By the early 1980s, the teenage population had exploded, after decades of upheaval and change, and the mall was, for young people, the place to see and be seen.
The film was also one of the first to focus on the realities of peer pressure and sex, financial responsibilities, as well as a storyline about abortion, which at the time had only been legal for 11 years.
It grossed $27.09 million at the domestic box office during its original theatrical run, after being produced on a budget of approximately $4.5 million.
Cult classic
It has since earned over $50 million globally and has a mass cult following.
In 2020, during COVID, Sean and Dane Cook organized a free-to-watch table read that included a discussion by Cameron and Amy, and saw Brad Pitt, Jennifer Aniston, Julia Roberts, Matthew McConaughey, Shia LaBeouf, Henry Golding, and John Legend all take on the iconic characters, with Morgan Freeman as the narrator and Sean played "the pizza guy".
It drew more than four million online viewers and raised more than $135,000 for charities.
