Party Girl

Dir: Daisy von Scherler Mayer
1995
If it weren’t for Parker Posey, this film wouldn’t have much going for it, an irresponsible-youth-gains-maturity tale played out in a series of sketches. She plays Mary the titular party girl who lives day-to-day throwing rent parties in New York and waltzing around in fabulous clothes. There’s trouble in the opening moments where we’re not even shown how great these supposed parties are, before she is arrested for possession of a joint and sent out to get a real job. She does this by working for her godmother in a neighborhood branch of the NYC library.
There’s a lot of cutesy-cutesy running gags about the Dewey Decimal System and a rather bland romance with a bland Lebanese falafel vendor. A subplot, featuring Mary’s DJ roommate and his burgeoning spinning career, goes nowhere. As does a scene where they get in the shower together (she’s late for work, he jumped his place in line). They kiss and nothing happens. Too many scenes are like this, suggesting plot twists but dropping them by the end of the scene.
Apparently, the film has a minor cult following, which I suspect is based around Posey’s performance, which is always watchable, even though her character isn’t the most likable or her character arc that fulfilling.
(This was another random library pickup from their DVD shelf. Can’t win ’em all.)