Synopsis
Brooklyn teenager Jeffrey Willis, thoroughly unhappy with his modest homestead, embraces the other-world aspects of his summer job at the posh Flamingo Club. He spurns his father in favor of the patronage of smooth-talking Phil Brody and is seduced by the ample bikini charms of club member Carla Samson. But thanks to a couple of late-summer hard lessons, the teen eventually realizes that family should always come first.
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Cast
- Matt DillonJeffrey Willis
- Hector ElizondoArthur Willis
- Molly McCarthyRuth Willis
- Martha GehmanNikki Willis
- Richard CrennaPhil Brody
- Jessica WalterPhyllis Brody
- Carole DavisJoyce Brody
- Janet JonesCarla Samson
- Brian McNamaraSteve Dawkins
- Fisher StevensHawk Ganz
Recommendations
- 88
Chicago Sun-Times
Dillon has the kind of acting intelligence that allows him to play each scene for no more than that particular scene is really about; he's not trying to summarize the message in every speech. That gives him an ease, an ability to play the teenage hero as if every day were a whole summer long. - 75
TV Guide Magazine
There's not a single bad performance here, and director Marshall wisely builds his film on small moments, realized with sympathy and intelligence. - 75
Miami Herald
There's always something happening at the edges of The Flamingo Kid. And unexpectedly, considering the genre, there's something happening at the center, too. [21 Dec 1984, p.D1] - 75
The Associated Press
The over-35 audience will savor this as a nostalgia trip while younger audiences may identify with the always current dilemma of impending adulthood. [03 Jan 1985] - 70
The New York Times
Even if The Flamingo Kid comes out of sit-com country, the character and the performance effortlessly rise above their origins. - 70
Time Out
Hardly original stuff, and morally the film wants to have its cake and eat it, celebrating working-class simplicity while revelling in the luxuriance of beach club life. But the performances compensate, with Dillon turning in a light and touching portrait of confused ambitions. - 70
Variety
Dillon does a good job in his fullest, least narcissistic characterization to date. - 70
Washington Post
The performances make up for the sloppy history in the film, and it's a good-hearted and diverting story. [21 Dec 1984, p.29]
