No Surrender Cinema: Angel
High school aged hookers! Sexually deviant killers! The seedy streets of LA! A Hare Krishna fighting a transvestite! All these elements and so much more gave us an 80’s cult classic, one that we’re going to go over in this edition of No Surrender Cinema. It’s time to hit up Hollywood Boulevard and check out Angel!
The titular character of Angel is not all that she seems. By night she’s an experienced streetwalker who isn’t afraid to walk away from a lowball offer or spot a cop conducting a sting. By day she’s Molly Stewart, a 15 year old straight A student going through all the typical trials and tribulations of high school. She kindly turns down a nerd with a crush on her, and flat out rejects the douchebag jock that harasses her constantly. She also bonds with a caring teacher, who thinks Molly should consider some extra-curricular activities. Molly states that she’s simply unable to due to family commitments, but it’s actually her alter ego that’s eating up all of her free time.
Speaking of family, Molly/Angel’s familial bond is strong with her fellow street people. There’s the aging Western movie star, Kit Carson, who stands on the streets in full cowboy regalia, waxing nostalgic about the good old days to anyone who will listen. YoYo Charlie is a trickster dressed up like silent film star Charlie Chaplin. Last but certainly not least is Mae, a sharp tongued transvestite who acts as the mother hen to Angel and other young ladies of the night. All of these characters are enjoying their lives out on the fringe of society, that is until a killer takes it upon himself to lower the prostitute population. This draws the attention of Lt. Andrews, a gruff cop who shows disdain for pretty much everyone around him, but warns the streetwalkers to stay safe. He also takes a shine to Angel, and as he continues to investigate the killings that are going on, he’s also trying to figure out why a young girl with a bright future is choosing to live her life as a sex worker.
For as much as Lt. Andrews grows to like Molly/Angel and wants to help her find a way out, we also have a killer that has set his sights on her. The Killer (which is what the film credits list him as) is played by John Diehl, who readers of this site may remember from early seasons of Miami Vice, or as David Sloan’s confidant Jack in Kickboxer 2: The Road Back. The Killer clearly has some Oedipal issues to work out, and it’s what’s motivating him to kill off the Hollywood Boulevard hookers. One of the best parts about Angel is how we can clearly understand that he’s some type of psychosexual madman, but not because of any profound speeches or snide remarks. The Killer is kept quiet throughout the film, and his modus operandi is made clear to the audience by not just the killings, but by his actions surrounding the deed. He stares at a picture of his mother and sucks the yoke out of an egg (and if you don’t get where they were going with that one, visit your local college campus and sign up for Psychology 101). He frequents porn theaters. After killing Angel’s friend Lana, he takes a brush and scrubs himself clean to the point where his skin must have been raw. The Killer is a marvelous foil for our heroine, and is right up there with Warren from 10 To Midnight as far as sex obsessed slayers go.
Things come crashing down for The Killer after Angel discovers Lana’s body. He gets caught in an X-rated theater and is brought in for a lineup, but a shootout in the police station results in his escape. Now that The Killer realizes that Angel has fingered him (not like that, creeps), he runs home and goes through the ritual of changing his look just enough to avoid detection, hellbent on killing her next. Andrews swears that he’ll protect her, but all the recent stress and tragedy leads to the life Molly has created for herself to come crashing down around her too. The scumbags from high school see her on the street one night and drag her into a car, flat out saying that they’re going to rape her for rejecting them so often. These a-holes don’t realize that they’re not dealing with the reserved girl from school anymore, and Angel not only fires off a few warning shots to show that she’s more than willing to blow them away, but makes the main dickhead piss himself. As revenge, the boys blab at school about Molly’s hooking. Molly’s teacher finds the gun hidden in her locker, and the shy nerd who had been persistent in asking Molly out now wants to give her his life savings ($23) to screw her. Mae goes so far as to try to pose as Molly’s mother for the teacher, but the façade is soon found out by everyone. Molly’s father left years ago, her mother ran off with someone and left her with $100 and the key to their apartment. Since she was 12 years old, Molly has had to fend for herself, turning tricks because it was the best source of income, whether she liked it or not. Mae has been protecting her for as long as she’s known him, and once Andrews sees the poor hand she’s been dealt, he also opens up to her more.
For an 80’s sexploitation thriller, the violence in Angel is relatively tame. In fact, it’s not until the final act that the blood really starts to flow The Killer, now shaved bald, blends in with a troupe of Hare Krishna’s, using this guise to find Angel. When he bursts into Angel’s apartment, he finds Mae, and it met with a moment of confusion as to why there’s a rather butch man dressed up in grandma’s church clothes. The two tangle, brawling all over the apartment until Mae meets his demise by the wrong end of The Killer’s knife. When Molly and Andrews return home and see the massacre left in her bedroom, Molly/Angel races out onto the streets, gun in hand, having finally had enough. Kit and Andrews pursue her, and just when it looks like Molly has gotten herself to a point of no return, Kit appears and becomes the hero of the day. Normally in these types of movies the heroine becomes the biggest badass on the planet, but for everything they did to establish Molly’s Angel side, it worked to have her be out of her element when she came face to face with The Killer. Story wise, it also worked to have Kit come to the rescue of Angel and Andrews, as all the old man wanted was to once again stand tall and save the day as he did in so many of his films.
The popularity of Angel spawned several sequels, with Avenging Angel hitting theaters only a year after the first film. I can remember watching them constantly on cable in the late 80’s, and during the early 90’s the original trilogy was a staple of USA’s Up All Night. The action quotient was definitely upped in the future installments, as they transitioned Angel into more of your typical low budget badass babe, but to me the best Angel is the one we see here in the first film. Donna Wilkes truly sank her teeth into the role, going so far as to walk the streets with prostitutes and visit halfway houses to understand the lives that they led. At 25, she didn’t really pass for 15, but she gave Angel a legitimately younger feel. You didn’t feel like this was a TV show that casts 30 year olds as high school kids (and there’s nothing wrong with that, I love those shows!). Wilkes’ youthful appearance granted her a slightly naive look, which was fitting for a girl that was met with the ultimate last resort, and is now trying to survive a maniac’s rampage.
To me, Angel is one of the perfect cult flicks of the 80’s era. We get a little T, we get a little A(ction), and we get a memorable cast of characters. Dick Shawn as Mae is a true highlight, and when he quips “Nothing stops the action.” early in the film, he didn’t know how right he’d be. Angel is available on DVD (the set contains the original trilogy, while the weak 4th installment is omitted), and can currently be found uploaded in all its glory on YouTube. It’s essential viewing for those who embrace B movies, and the cast delivers a solid effort, with the performances of Wilkes, Shawn, and Diehl as the standouts.
