Ping Pong Summer

In this time machine and genre fun rolled into one, Michael Tully, whose Septien screened at the 2^nd AFF, takes audiences to the 1980s, a decade filled with synthetic kitsch and films like The Breakfast Club and Karate Kid. The caricature characters: shy nerds, mean bullies, giggling girls and stiff though well-intentioned parents, spend their vacation in a world of pop culture fetishes. They have bad haircuts, colorful clothes, and gold chains. They kill boredom in arcades filled with pulsing lights and cosmic sounds, and carry monstrous boom boxes that terrorize the neighborhood with electronic music. They go to amusement parks and eat softies. Above all, however, they play Ping-Pong, which rises to the ranks of extreme sport; entertainment for real men and a lifestyle. All of it is so colorful and carefree that it becomes overly psychedelic. Susan Sarandon appears in a cameo among the youthful actors.