"Pete, you're my friend! I can't hate you!"
Unlike many people of my generation, I did not grow up watching The Buttercream Gang; rather, I was introduced to it by some friends years after its peak in popularity.The Buttercream Gang was one of those 90s straight-to-video movies that was shown in thousands of classrooms across the U.S., but it's not like other school movies. It's... a rather unique movie.
Basically, the plot focuses on four guys in a group called the Buttercream Gang. How they got this name has something to do with a previous group of guys that churned butter for poor widows, or something like that... either way, the movie doesn't focus on them, but rather, on the new, modern generation of Buttercreamers in the town(something like Elk Ridge, or Golden Valley, or Glens Falls... I can't remember; it's basically an idylic name for a rather small Midwestern town). They don't churn butter anymore, but they do other random tasks for widows and other members of the community (one of the more dramatic scenes involves the members helping out "The Widow Jenkins"). The president of this group, a fellow named Pete Turner(nee Valdez), who seems to be the oldest, has to move to Chicago to live with his aunt and be a role model to his cousins(who we never see). So, right before leaving, he names Scott as the new president of the Buttercreamers.
Only six minutes in, we hit a major plot twist.... Pete falls into a bad crowd(oh noes!) and has to return to Elk Ridge(that's it, that's the name of the town). So, he gets to join up with the Buttercreamers again, but because the bad folks corrupted his personality, Pete acts like a jerk. The rest of the film deals with how Scott, a nice but rather dramatic kid who's worried all of the time, deals with how his friend has changed. (No more spoilers, I revealed too much already.) By the way, don't bother reading the Wikipedia synopsis; it was written from an anti-Eldon and Lanny point of view, describing them as having less "honesty and conviction" than Scott. This is actually not the case; Eldon and Lanny seem to be as capable in good deed doing as Scott, but the fact that the movie is not about them the way it's about Scott means that their good deeds are not focused on as much. They don't seem to take the initiative the way that Scott does, but that's not a moral failing, and it certainly doesn't make these boys dishonest. But I digress.
Really, one of the best things about this film is how it emphasizes forgiveness. Granted, this is something that isn't all that subtle, especially when viewing the promotional information on the DVD case. Still, the human need for forgiveness when a person messes up is a universal one, so this makes the movie timeless.
What doesn't make the movie timeless is the aesthetic values... it's a film made in the early 90s and it shows.
The soundtrack, for instance, has an instrumentation very characteristic of the era; over-sentimentalized piano playing, subtle trumpet solos, and country-ish harmonica(as opposed to the blues-style harmonica playing found in earlier films like The Blues Brothers). More obviously, the clothing styles are definitely dated. Even when Pete starts wearing more edgy, urban clothing, to me, he still looks at best plain and mainstream (a doo-rag is no longer considered to be a scandalous article of clothing), and at worst, silly and poseur-ish. Now, for me, since I grew up in this era, the familiarity gives me a good old ironic sense of nostalgia, but your mileage might vary.
As for the acting, for the most part it's pretty standard. One particular role is that of Pete's aunt(played by Teri-Lisa Mulligan), who has only one major scene, but that scene is legendary. As far as acting skills go, Mulligan is strictly better than Sophia Coppola, but not quite as good as Tommy Wiseau. Alas, Teri-Lisa Mulligan seems to have vanished from the entertainment world forever; she never acted in another movie.
This brings me to the last aspect about The Buttercream Gang. On its face, this movie is not a comedy; it's a light drama meant for kids. Yet, it still has brought laughter to several of my friends and me. Imagine that. It's hard to pinpoint why, but somehow, all of the dated stylistic features in the movie combine with the not-so-subtle morals to create a movie that still is entertaining.
So, on the whole, The Buttercream Gang is a movie that has a strong charm to it, in spite of its weaknesses. It's definitely a good movie for get-togethers with friends.
Rating: 6 stars out of 10.
