Written by Robert Scucci | Published
Overprotective parents are a tough nut to crack. On the other hand, can you really blame a mother or father for trying to protect their children from the horrors of the world, no matter how misguided their efforts? On the other hand, sometimes you just have to push the baby bird out of the nest and see if it can fly on its own. In extreme cases, you may have to trick your daughter into thinking that whenever she is aroused, she will burst into flames, like in 1987. Sweet Girls Who Don’t Blow Up.
Sweet Girls Who Don’t Blow Up it’s a rom-com that relies on this one joke, and then runs it down. It’s one of those interesting situations where a joke wears out its welcome in the first act, checks the seeker’s bar in the second act to see how much more you have to endure, and then somehow pulls things back in the third. It’s like saying the same word over and over again until it loses its meaning, but before the activity makes you aware. everything it doesn’t matter, and you and the word become one in an almost zen-like state.
At least that’s what I felt in my heart while watching Sweet Girls Who Don’t Blow Up.
Don’t Forget Your Fire Extinguisher!
Every source I can find watches Sweet Girls Who Don’t Blow Up at 92 minutes, but the version streaming on Tubi only uses 82. This could mean one of two things: the sources are wrong, or there’s a long cut floating around somewhere. I hope it’s the former, because since the entire film is built around one joke that repeats ad nauseam, any extended version would likely be pretty much the same. Worse, if that video was cut to slow motion, it might not have made the movie any better.
Speaking of humor, here it is. April Flowers (Michelle Meyrink) has a rare problem where her surroundings burst into flames whenever she is sexually aroused. Or so he thought. In fact, his overprotective mother (Barbara Harris) carves out plastic fireworks and sets them off from a distance to scare off potential suitors. He follows April on dates and finds her trigger-happy with her explosives, sending her daughter home depressed after the whole disaster.
When her old neighbor and love interest Andy (William O’Leary) returns to town before receiving a ping pong scholarship in China, the two collide. It didn’t take long for my mother to go back to her old habits. He continues to light up April with explosions on stage, even setting the cat on fire, but Andy starts to catch on when he realizes that these incidents don’t happen when Mom isn’t around.
The rest of the film follows that pattern. Andy comes close to exposing Mom, retaliating, and ends up disappointed in the process. He’s been caught with his pants down more than once, but never for what it looks like. Andy is not smart, and April’s scheming mother uses that to her advantage. Determined to live up to their needs, April and Andy decide to do the unthinkable by having sex to prove their mother wrong, thinking she’s destroying them first.
A One-Note Joke Made to Die For
Sweet Girls Who Don’t Blow Up it’s more fun than I’d like to admit, but I’d be lying if I said it was a fun movie. Barbara Harris, Michelle Meyrink, and William O’Leary understand the role well, and their chemistry carries the film even when it hits a dead horse. It’s a silly, low-key romp that never crosses the line into offensive, but it’s surprisingly dangerous for something rated PG.
It won’t change your life, and some of the gangs, like the restaurant that’s starting to happen, actually stay down. This is not a smart movie. There is no subtext or ambiguity lurking beneath the surface. And sometimes that’s just what you need after burning your mental energy all day.
Most importantly, Sweet Girls Who Don’t Blow Up it streams for free on Tubi, so it won’t cost you anything but your time.
