In the Pawpaw Patch

By J.C.

BUSTER AND BILLIE

Directed by DANIEL PETRIE Screenplay by RON TURBEVILLE

This is a wistful little period piece about a gang bang. The film makers --and especially the screenwriter, who based his script on real people from his high school days--wax nostalgic for delicate love and ruined innocence. These commodities were evidently to be found right after World War II down in rural Georgia, where some kids on the way to being good ole boys conduct puberty rites by jumping on the acquiescent body of Billie (Joan Goodfellow). Acquiescent, but not responsive. As the fellows wriggle and writhe, Billie lies there, face turned away, absently tossing pebbles into the swamp water. Billie may not be quite all there.

The only member of this group of friends who does not take advantage of Billie's availability is Buster (Jan-Michael Vincent), steady and sensitive beyond his years. He is the most popular and respected boy at the local high school. When a friendly storekeeper asks Buster why he does not go along on the Billie expeditions, he replies that he is "the Lone Ranger" and he likes moments of intimacy to be private.

Since the title of this movie is Buster and Billie, it is a pretty sure bet that Billie is going to meet the most popular boy in school. Indeed, Buster soon asks her out and has his way with her--privately, to be sure--in the front seat of the family pickup. Romance and Billie blossom, more or less in that order. The pair pass a great deal of time making love, going skinny-dipping and observing the photogenic glories of nature, while Buster's buddies become increasingly irked. The love affair violates the tenets of what the film makers see as ingrained redneck bigotry, swinishness and evil. The boys decide to do something about Buster and Billie, almost as if acting out Last Summer. That was a movie they could never have seen, of course. But it almost seems as if the screenwriter caught it.

Buster and Billie contains some good acting--by Vincent and Goodfellow and, most especially, by a boy named Robert Englund, who plays Buster's best friend--and some well-observed Southern ambience. But mostly the film makers work efficiently against what small quality they manage to generate.

Graduation day seems a long way off for everybody. -J.C.

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