Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Gas, Food, Lodging Blu-ray Movie Review

Laramie Girls.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman November 17, 2018

The universe sometimes (often?) works in mysterious ways. For reasons which will perhaps be obvious (or at least discernable) to those who know both properties, I kind of started thinking of Gilmore Girls as I was watching Gas Food Lodging (the title is variously rendered with or without commas), Allison Anders’ 1992 film featuring a hard working waitress single mom and her two daughters. Yes, that two daughter thing is an obvious manifest difference, but there’s a kind of underlying dynamic at play in the film which in some ways presages the long running series. In any case, the mysterious universe supplied a little punchline when I turned to my New York Times crossword app shortly after watching the movie and one of the first clues which greeted me was “Gilmore Girls girl” (the answer was Rory, for those wondering). As Anders gets into in an appealing interview included on this Blu-ray release as a supplement, she pretty radically reinvented Richard Peck’s source novel Don’t Look and It Won’t Hurt, since, as Anders herself states on a few occasions in the interview, “I write my own stuff.” Those changes evidently included whittling down an original three daughters from the novel, as well as giving mom Nora (Brooke Adams) more of a love life. There’s a bittersweet quality running through Gas Food Lodging, and the focal trio of Nora and daughters Trudi (Ione Skye) and Shade (Fairuza Balk) are all brought memorably to life in a somewhat vignette driven enterprise that highlights the sometimes perilous trajectories that can develop between parent and child, as well as siblings.

Shade’s narration informs part of Gas Food Lodging, and the film does tend to follow her point of view despite getting into a number of events involving Nora and Trudi. The trio is in (fictional) Laramie, New Mexico, a town even more remote and less developed than Stars Hollow, and in fact the three live in a trailer in what is a fairly barren landscape. Shade is a devotee of films featuring Mexican actress Elvia Romero (Nina Balenger), who stars in overheated dramas that had they been on television could have easily qualified as telenovelas. Trudi meanwhile seems to be a bit on the sexually promiscuous side, at least as evidenced by her appearance and her emphasis on dates. Both girls are kind of casually dismissive of their hard working mother, though Shade’s movie going experiences have led her to believe that she can solve her mother’s personal problems by simply finding the right man for her. Shade is convinced that will allow them all to do “normal family stuff”, a none too subtle allusion to the fact that the family dynamic here is at least a little unusual.

Romantic or at least relationship entanglements for all three females provide most of the story, though it’s the way the three interact with each other that ends up providing most of the emotional content. Trudi ends up with a guy named Dank (Robert Knepper), who seems perhaps a tad “exotic” to be in this location (I’m frankly curious if this character is in the original novel), but who ends up causing some drama for the already troubled girl. Shade, on the other hand, has her eyes on a local kid named Darius (Donovan Leitch), though it’s perhaps good that this relationship isn’t consummated given the fact that the actors playing the parts are real life siblings. Instead Shade maybe feels a few sparks with Javier (Jacob Vargas), a kid who is rather shockingly called a “wetback” by Trudi when he works as a busboy at the same restaurant where Nora is employed, but who later shows up as the projectionist at the theater Shade frequents to catch films by her favorite star.

Nora’s personal life is a bit more complicated, or at least more busy. A trio of men, including her daughters’ father John (James Brolin), drift in and out of the story, with Nora trying to find a little happiness at the edges of an otherwise kind of stifling existence. Trudi’s predicament actually provides some drama (some may argue melodrama) in the latter half or so of the picture, but really the emotional emphasis still tends to be placed squarely on Shade’s rather remarkable shoulders.

I’m not sure Gas Food Lodging ever really manages to deliver the sort of cathartic atmosphere it seems to be aiming for, but in its smaller moments it’s really quite charming and often very moving. The performances are pitch perfect throughout, giving a nice lived in quality to characters who have all had their fair share of troubles, but who have a certain inner resilience to help them survive.

Gas, Food, Lodging Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Gas Food Lodging is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Arrow Academy with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. Arrow's insert booklet contains only the following generic verbiage about the transfer:

Gas Food Lodging is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1 with 2.0 stereo sound. The HD Master was provided by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

We're showing another version of Gas, Food, Lodging that looks like it was relatively recently a part of Sony's MOD program, a program whose quality can at times not be quite up to the usual standards of the august label, and my hunch is this is probably the same master, since it has a few issues along the way. A lot of the brightly lit outdoor material pops quite nicely, with excellent detail levels in things like the often complex patterns in fabrics that both Shade and Trudi wear. But there's fairly wide variability throughout this presentation both in terms of sharpness and clarity, but also in terms of grain resolution and density and saturation. Some of the rougher looking moments are shown in screenshots 18 and 19, where the darkness of the environment certainly contributes, but there are other, more brightly lit moments, where things can look a little mottled (see screenshot 5 for one example). Other moments seem a bit blanched when compared to the bulk of the presentation (see screenshots 8 and 11). Nothing here is horrible by any stretch, and there's a refreshing lack of major damage to be seen, but this is a title that might have benefited from a new scan and some restoration efforts.

Gas, Food, Lodging Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Gas Food Lodging features a nice sounding LPCM 2.0 track, one which supports some of the enjoyable musical elements quite well, while also rendering what is in essence a pretty "talky" enterprise without any problems. Ambient environmental effects dot a lot of the outdoor material, and dialogue is always rendered with clarity and no issues with regard to dropouts or distortion.

Gas, Food, Lodging Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This is the first release I can recall personally reviewing that refers to "views expressed in value added materials" in the opening "disclosure" text divorcing the releasing entities from any connection to said materials. The "value added materials" are:

• The Road to Laramie: A Look Back at Gas, Food, Lodging (1080p; 29:54) is an appealing conversation between Allison Anders and screenwriter Josh Olson.


• Cinefile: Reel Women (1080i; 34:15) is a really interesting 1995 documentary by Chris Rodley documenting some of the female pioneers in filmmaking like Allison Anders, Jane Campion, Kathryn Bigelow, Penny Marshall and Gale Anne Hurd.


• Image Gallery (1080p; 7:30)

As usual, Arrow has also provided a nicely appointed insert booklet.

Gas, Food, Lodging Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Gas Food Lodging is a bittersweet film and one that coasts a considerable way on the combined charisma of an effective cast. The story has a bit of a struggle maintaining forward momentum, and the ending seems a bit anticlimactic in a way, but there's some honest emotion here that may recommend the film to those who like smaller scale character studies. Video has a few passing issues, but audio is fine and the supplements quite enjoyable. Recommended.