Neil Simon has written more hit plays than any other American playwright.  This success has translated over to the sliver screen where many of his Broadway shows have been turned into popular movies.  Barefoot in the Park, The Odd Couple, Sweet Charity, and The Sunshine Boys, just to name a few, were all based on Simon's plays.  But what is a producer to do when there are no more of Neil Simon's hit plays to turn into movies?  Why adapt one of his (few) flops of course!  And that's Star Spangled Girl is, a screen adaptation of Simon's first Broadway failure.

Star Spangled Girl stars Sandy Duncan as Amy Cooper, a patriotic girl from a small town in Florida who moves to LA to train for the Olympics.  Amy moves into the same apartment complex as Andy Hobart (Tony Roberts) and Norman Cornell (Todd Susman)  the editor and writer, respectively, of "The Nitty Gritty," an underground newspaper.  Though the paper has never made a dime, the two are dedicated to pointing out the injustices in America and struggle to get each issue out.  That is until Norman sees (or rather smells) Amy.  He falls instantly in love with her and can no longer write.  Norman throws himself at Amy, pulling stunts and giving her gifts to try to win her affection.  The harder he tries, the more she dislikes him.  Andy just wants to get the next issue of the paper out, and tries to get Norman to forget about the girl, and get Amy to be nice to Norman, none of which work.

The plot, like most of Simon's plays, is very simple and uncomplicated.  The difference between this movie and say, Barefoot in the Park, is that Star Spangled Girl isn't funny.   The situations have the potential for humor, but it just never pays off.  The dialog has that familiar Neil Simon cadence to it, with a lot of  banter flying back and forth, but the jokes fall flat.  The movie has all the things one would expect from a Neil Simon play, except the humor.

The reason that the comedy doesn't work is because the characters don't seem real.  It is hard to understand what motivates them or why they are doing what they do.   Norman goes from writing day and night, to being infatuated with Amy because he smells her hair as she walks by his open window.  Andy is only concerned with getting the paper out, even thought it is causing him to go into debt and Amy just bewildered most of the time.  It just leaves you scratching your head in wonder.

There are a few problems with details of the plot too. It is very hard to gauge the passage of time in the movie.  The film starts with Amy arriving in L.A. knowing no one, yet a few scenes later she is talking about her finance who goes to UCLA.  Where did he come from?   When Andy is introduced at the beginning of the movie, he steals food and clothes in order to make him seem dedicated and noble.  It really just makes him look hypocritical, especially when he complains about injustice.

Neil Simon wasn't happy with the stageplay version of this movie.  As he said in 1977: "Star Spangled Girl is clearly and simply a failure, as far as I'm concerned." The filmed version doesn't work either.  The simple plot has holes, the characters are uninteresting, and the jokes, while they appear frequently, just don't work. It leaves one wondering why this flawed paly was choosen to be made into a movie.

The acting was a mixed bag.  Though I did have a hard time believing that she was an Olympic athlete, Sandy Duncan did a great job as the wide-eyed country girl who just arrived in the big city.  Tony Roberts is competent, and has very good comical timing.  It's too bad the script didn't make better use of his talent.  Todd Susman was teh weak link.  He overacted through the entire movie.  A more sublet approach to the material would have benefited the movie greatly, and made his character less irritating.

This DVD is presented in digital stereo sound.  There are no foreign language tracks or subtitles, but English subtitles are available.

The sound was average for a thirty year old movie.  There was not a lot of hiss or noise, and the dialog was easy to understand.  The sound was not powerful, nor was it weak.  There was no use made of the front soundstage.
 

Video:

Paramount released this movie in widescreen anamorphic format.  It doesn't look like any restoration was done for this release, but a reasonably clean print was used.   Unfortunately, the print has faded with the years and the colors are a little dull.  There is some grain present throughout most of the film, but it is not a major defect.  There are some specks and dirt present, but they occur fairly infrequently, and do not cause distraction.  An average looking disc.

The Extras:

This is a bare bones disc.  There are no extras, not even a trailer.

Final Thoughts:

While Star Spangled Girl isn't as funny as Neil Simon's other works, it does have one or two amusing moments.  It's a family friendly movie, though younger viewers might not understand the rapid dialog.  Though flawed, it is worth the price of a rental.