Desperately Seeking Susan (Susan Seidelman)

This is a likeable, entertaining piece of inconsequential fluff that's pleasantly digestible and quickly forgotten, but it has a few things going for it. Rosanna Arquette is an actress I like watching, Steven Wright is funny, the movie is light on its feet, and it has an understated visual splendor that finds odd little details and interesting human faces in the background of every scene. Madonna isn't terrible in it, which makes this her best performance, and it's nice to see her back when she was fun, still had a little baby fat, and knew how to write great pop songs. God, she's boring now. It's also fun to play Spot the New York Hipster Cameos. You could make a fine drinking game out of it, if by fine you mean clinically dead. By the film's halfway point, I'd already spotted Richard Hell, Arto Lindsay, John Lurie, Richard Edson, Rockets Redglare, Giancarlo Esposito, Ann Magnuson, and John Turturro. Were Jim Jarmusch and Steve Buscemi out of town that month? I think they were.