Not having seen each other for years, the four friends come together when Christina is having a baby. Samantha, played by Demi Moore, recalls the summer of 1970, when they were 12 and slowly moving into adolescence. Each girl struggles with her own problem — Samantha with her parents’ divorce, Roberta with the death of her mother, Teeny with the fact that her parents don’t care about her, and Christina with an overbearing, protective mother.
The girls’ goal that summer is to raise enough money to get a tree house. In their quest, they run across a mystery. While at a graveyard attempting to perform a séance, a cracked tombstone leads them to believe they brought a boy named Dear Johnny back to life.
They spend their summer trying to figure out the mystery of Dear Johnny’s death and in the process, they go through changes from children to young women. Roberta experiences her first kiss. The girls learn to accept who they are and how they live.
I liked this one because they talked about real issues they went through growing up — ones that are perhaps more relatable to real life than the other exaggerated high school movies. It dealt with more sensitive issues like divorce, death and conflicts with parents. It was still a chick flick, nonetheless, because they also discussed boys and their first kisses. But it was a new twist on the romance and love, and I liked how this movie was a little closer to reality.
