I Watch Films: Angel (1984)

 

Angel (1984)

Molly is a high school student at an exclusive private school by day; by night she’s Angel, a hooker on Hollywood Boulevard*. She has a number of friends there; Kit Carson, a former cowboy actor who claimed to have worked with Tom Mix**; Mr Yo-yo who does yo-yo tricks; Mae, a drag queen; Crystal and Lana, two other sex workers; and Solly, a painter and lesbian, her landlady, who indulges in the pretence that her mother has had a stroke (she actually abandoned her).

Some plot arrives in the form of a nameless serial killer of sex workers who we mostly see working out in his shabby hotel room, lurking, and occasionally killing. The police get involved, Lt Andrews taking charge. After Crystal is killed he talks to all the Hollywood Boulevard people, suggesting the sex workers go in pairs. Unfortunately this turns out to be impractical and when Lana picks up a client she and Angel split up, only for Lana to be killed.

Angel is now a witness, and the police use her description to pick up the killer. At an identification line up she spots him, but he steals a police officer’s gun and shoots his way out. Lt Andrews takes her home where he discovers her situation. Meanwhile a guidance counselor at school is concerned that Molly doesn’t take part in extra-curriculars, and although she’s put off by her story of caring for her mother, starts to pay attention to her. So do several boys.

Things start to fall apart when some boys cruising on Hollywood Boulevard recognise Angel as Molly and try to drag her away in their car. She threatens them with her gun (serial killer on the loose) and escapes, but they spread the story around school. The counselor comes around and Mae attempts to impersonate Molly’s mother, which doesn’t work, but does manage to get the guidance counselor to leave. Unfortunately at that moment the killer comes looking for Angel, kills Mae, but Andrews, Angel and Kit follow him for the final sequence.

This is, of course, a sleazy, exploitative, occasionally wince-inducing film. But the characters, especially Angel’s street family, are all great fun. Especially good is that all of Kit Carson’s stories appear to be true, not exaggerated, he really did know Tom Mix, he really is a deadshot. Does this somehow make the film good? No, I can’t say that it does, but it’s not entirely the bottom feeding creeper it first appears to be.

Watch This: Hollywood Boulevard thriller with a double identity protagonist
Don’t Watch This: Really wants us to enjoy the idea of a teen schoolgirl who is a sex worker

* We see her propositioned twice, turning them down (one for offering too little, the other for being a cop); the one client she actually takes back to the room she shares with another girl leaves before they have sex when they discover a dead body

** Who is Tom Mix someone asks, and fair, he died in 1940, 44 years before this film was made