1995 was a busy year for young, up-and-coming actress Christina Ricci. She starred in three films that year, the coming of age drama Now and Then, the comic spiritual adaptation Casper, and finally this film, another coming-of-age drama co-starring My Girl’s Anna Chlumsky. Of the three films, this one is the most interesting to look at. It starts out as a generic story about a young girl uprooted from the city life and transplanted in rural Washington where she makes an unlikely friendship with the town pariah. However, there is a darker story going on just offscreen that hints that it may take things down a rather unexpected path.
The basic premise here is Beth Easton (Christina Ricci) and her mother (Polly Draper) have relocated to the small town of Wheaton, Washington ostensibly to work on a new book, although we never see her actually working on it. Beth is initially unhappy with the move until she nearly crashes her bike into Jody (Anna Chlumsky), an ostracized tomboy and a bit of a troublemaker. The two form a fast friendship despite warnings from others in the town. Eventually it becomes obvious that Jody is being abused by her mother’s drunken boyfriend, something she refuses to admit to for fear of being accused of lying about the situation.
Early on in the proceedings, Gold Diggers is on shaky ground. The story of a young teen being uprooted to the countryside has been done to death. Christina Ricci’s early scenes are not well acted, either. At this point in her career she was more known for playing characters with a bit of an edge so she seems out of her element when acting among the more popular girls in town. Her lines come out forced and unnatural. It’s not until Jody comes properly into the picture that Ricci finds her character and settles down.
Once the story shifts away from the fish-out-of-water it becomes a better film, one that feels more natural. There’s no denying Anna Chlumsky is doing the heavy lifting here. Everything from her mannerisms to the way she dresses tells us what is going on just off screen. Her acting out, stealing from the school and hiding from the sheriff, while a tad heavy-handed, gives us a good sense of where this story may be going. This is not to dismiss Christina Ricci, who, once she gets past the first few scenes, sells us on a girl who really cares for Jody when everyone else is dismissive of her.
The best moments in this film happen right about the half-way point when the two girls take a small boat out to Bear Mountain, the sight of an old gold mine from one of Jody’s books. While inside a cave on the side of the mountain Jody reluctantly reveals that she has been abused and that she has a hideout here equipped to allow her to stay for extended periods of time. An accident occurs and Beth finds herself trapped under a large rock with the tide coming in. Jody is forced to swim to the mainland and get help before Beth can drown. This moment is tense and a real highlight of the entire film. If only the rest of the film could have lived up to it.
This movie falters in its final act. The story and the direction it’s headed to is not at fault here. The issue is it never quite goes dark enough to really sell the drama. We learn midway through the story that Jody’s father figure, Ray (David Keith), is a drunk and abuser yet he gets away with it for so long because apparently the sheriff went to school with him and can’t see him in this light. This explanation is ridiculous. Jody has bruises on her back and her mother is afraid of the man, too, yet the sheriff can’t believe anything but his personal biases from their school days. Jody refuses to tell the police about it as she feels he will be believed and she will be branded a liar. Later, this proves to be exactly what happens. Also, none of the actual abuse happens on-screen in even the most minor ways so it leaves this storyline without any real grit. I’m not saying we need so see Jody or her mother getting beat up, that would be distasteful, but a scene or two where we really feel his menace or see that anger just beneath the surface would have helped. Instead, the only time we get anything resembling danger from him is in the finale which, like the rest of the film, plays out mostly off screen. It’s frustrating and robs the ending of any real stakes.
This film was made with a juvenile audience in mind and, with that in consideration, it mostly succeeds. It has just enough action to keep tweens entertained without alienating older audiences. However, it plays things much too safe at times. The only tense moments in the film involve Beth trapped under a boulder while the tide comes in threatening to drown her. The finale fails to live up to that moment and the epilogue is even worse. Still, this could have been a much worse film than it is. It’s inoffensive and it goes down easy. A director with a better sense of action set-pieces and tone could have elevated this into the realm of a childhood classic. As it is, though, it is a descent little story that has mostly been forgotten, its target audience moved on to better things.
Release Date: November 3, 1995
Running Time: 93 Minutes
Rated: PG
Starring: Christina Ricci, Anna Chlumsky, Polly Draper and David Keith
Directed By: Kevin James Dobson
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