Foxfire (1996 film)

Infobox Film
name = Foxfire


caption = Foxfire DVD cover
director =
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starring = Hedy Burress - "Madeline Wirtz"
Angelina Jolie - "Margaret "Legs" Sadovsky"
Jenny Lewis - "Rita Faldes"
Jenny Shimizu - "Goldie Goldberg"
Sarah Rosenberg - "Violet Kahn"
Michelle Brookhurst-"Cindy"
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released = 1996
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amg_id =
imdb_id = 0116353

"Foxfire" is a 1996 movie based on the Joyce Carol Oates novel "".

The movie describes the coming of age of four high school girls who meet up with a mysterious and beautiful drifter.

Synopsis

"Foxfire" is narrated by Maddie Wirtz, a high-school senior living a rather normal life in the suburbs of Portland, Oregon. Maddie is in control of her life, with a boyfriend, and plans to go to art school. One day in science class, the students are watching the teacher Mr. Buttinger try to make Rita Faldes dissect a frog. A mysterious and beautiful leather jacket-clad "new student" stands up to Mr. Buttinger and releases Rita's frog. When Mr. Buttinger sentences them both to detention, the drifter reveals that she's not a new student after all, and escapes through the same window as the frog.

Later, in the girls' room, the drifter and some other girls are listening to Rita describe Mr. Buttinger's untoward advances. When the drifter says the only way to stop the teacher is to stick together, the only girls to stay are Rita, Violet, and Maddie. When detention time comes, Mr. Buttinger indeed begins his advances toward Rita, but is startled by Violet's entry. When Maddie and the drifter come in soon after, he realizes the situation is becoming serious. The girls confront the teacher about his abuse, and they become involved in a physical altercation, which ends when the ordinarily shy Rita slams his face against a lab bench and tells him "if you ever put your hands on me again, I'm gonna snip your little nuts off with my toenail clippers." At this point Goldie Goldberg walks in, and joins the assault by declaring "this is great; Buttinger is such a fuck." The girls run from the school and then decide to go home.

At Maddie's house, Maddie is surprised by a knock at the window, which turns out to be the stranger from the earlier assault, there to return Maddie's dropped address book. The girl tells Maddie she's a drifter who got kicked out of school "for thinking for herself." Maddie agrees to let her sleep on the floor. The next morning, Maddie catches up with the girl on a bridge. The girl tells Maddie her name is "Legs", and brings Maddie's art supplies up onto the bridge. Maddie, who is afraid of heights, can't join her. A truck startles Legs, who drops the art portfolio over the edge of the bridge. Legs climbs over the edge of the bridge to retrieve the bag, which deeply impresses Maddie. As they part, Maddie tells Legs of an abandoned house up the river where Legs could stay.

At school, the girls are called in to the principal's office, where their claims of sexual harassment fall on deaf ears, and they are suspended for three weeks. The girls are escorted off campus, and Maddie is not allowed to retrieve her art school portfolio. Instead of going home with the news of their suspension, they all decide to go to the abandoned house up the river. There they meet Legs, who suggests they break into the school to get Maddie's portfolio.

The girls sneak into the high school through a vent, and go into the art room. While the other girls are busy collecting Maddie's work, Goldie is put off by an unflattering polaroid, and moves into a side room to smoke a joint. She throws her match into a pile of oily rags, starting a fire, and setting off the sprinklers. The girls have to escape the police who come to investigate, and eventually reconvene at the house.

Back at the house, Legs decides to commemorate the night by giving herself a tattoo of a flame on her breast. One by one, the other girls ask Legs to give them the same tattoo.

Changes between the book and the movie

The film adaptation of "Foxfire" made many significant changes to the book. While the novel is set in upstate New York in the 1950s, the movie is set 40 years later and across the country in Portland, Oregon. The novel covers more than three years, during which time several new members join the Foxfire gang. The film takes place during the course of a few weeks and with a smaller cast of characters. In the film, most of the Foxfire members come from comfortable suburban families. In the novel, they are working class girls from the "wrong side of the tracks" whose families suffer from domestic problems such as child abuse and alcoholism.

The character of Maddy is completely rewritten for the film. In the novel, Maddy is an intelligent girl but has a troubled home life and few prospects for the future. She is not artistic, but is interested in math and astronomy. In the film Maddy has a boyfriend and a good relationship with her mother, but in the novel she has never had a boyfriend and her mother is a WWII widow with mental health issues and a drinking problem. In the film the character of Lana, one of the founding members of Foxfire, is replaced with Violet, a later member of the gang.

References

External links

*imdb title|0116353|Foxfire