Wuchak RELEASED IN 1986 and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, "Peggy Sue Got Married" chronicles events when the title character (Kathleen Turner) faints at her 25th high school reunion and mysteriously finds herself back in school just before graduation, 25 years earlier! Will she make the same mistakes or make things better? Nicolas Cage plays her beau while Barry Miller plays a beatnik romantic interest. Catherine Hicks & Joan Allen appear as her besties and Lisa Jane Persky her nemesis. Kevin J. O'Connor is on hand as a geek wiz while Jim Carrey has a peripheral role. This is perhaps Coppola's most entertaining film in a popcorn-entertainment sense. It immediately brings to mind "Back to the Future" (1985), but is more adult-oriented and (obviously) comes from a female perspective. It also recalls "17 Again" (2009) and is closer in tone to that flick. If you like those movies you'll probably like this one. The movie offers a nice mix of superficial-yet-genuine amusement and weighty reflections. Cage employs an interesting weird-axx voice to the point that I was wondering if he was dubbed. Keep in mind that Turner was 31 during filming and it would be impossible to make her look genuinely 18 again; same thing with many of her costars. As such, you have to suspend disbelief a bit when you see them back in high school. THE MOVIE RUNS 1 hour & 43 minutes and was shot in Southern Cal (Santa Rosa, Petaluma & Coverdale). WRITERS: Jerry Leichtling & Arlene Sarner. GRADE: B+

canewkirk-78201 The acting was so over-the-top that it totally distracted from the plot. Nicholas Cage's performance was at best forgettable. Whoever thought a period piece with over the top characters would make a good movie was terribly wrong. Too predictable, most of the actors came off just above a cartoon performance.

HillstreetBunz It is Kathleen's deeply touching performance that holds the centre of this movie. The central conceit of "If I knew then what I know now" is nothing new (it wasn't in 1986 when this movie came out either) but what strikes me as unusual about the film, is the way the central characters foibles are presented with so little judgement, the reflection seeming to be just that youth has its follies., and so it seems does experience. With love, all is forgivable and everything can be overcome. Hardly a new perspective, and were it not for the wry script and well defined and beautifully played performances the story might be an overblown, twee nostalgia fest. But it's not. It speaks to the pain of disappointment in ones life, to things that might have been, to pain and loss and love and maturity and life's experience with an edge. Not coarsely, not by screaming at the audience, but through some truly tender moments, such Peggy Sue hearing her late grandmothers voice on the telephone, or coming to the aid of those she didn't understand so well as a girl. Turner is an intelligent actress (sadly underused for the last twenty years) capable of taking the audience deep into her characters own heart and mind, and when she gave this Oscar nominated performance she was possibly at the height of her career.

tomarx7 The first time I saw this movie, I was very inexperienced, as far as relationships and everything else. The movie bugged me, I did'nt appreciate it at all. But tonight watching it as someone who has now lived through much of what Peggy Sue did, I totally enjoyed the movie. The main message of this movie is to live in the present, and not to think so much about the future. Unfortunately in our current world, we tend to think about the future too much, to the point of not living in the moment ever hardly. This is why this movie resonated with me so much this time around. But I did find it irksome how old everyone looked, most of the cast were well over twenty playing teens. But their performances were pretty good. I remember really not liking Nicholas Cage for around ten years after this movie, I found his nasally falsetto voice very irritating. Now days he is one of my favorite actors. He still seems to be pretty much a regular guy and that is a quality I think a lot of the stars lose pretty quickly after a certain amount of time at the top.