Oranges is the best lesbian coming-of-age film yet. Originally planned as a three-parter for British television, this complex story takes us through the hazardous journey of a heroic young girl's escape from a religious upbringing. The film opens with the mother, the young Jess, and her white dog sitting atop a gravestone. Mum is alluding to her fall from grace while living in Paris as a young girl, and her rebirth as a Christian. "She'd never heard of mixed feelings," Jess tells us in voice-over. The screenplay, adapted by Jeanette Winterson from her own novel of the same title, is droll and endearing, frightening and funny—even while describing the perverted pedagogy of Christian cultists. It's a strange beginning of a life. Young Jess, ever observant and precocious, tells schoolmates that there are no toilets in hell. Later, she trots off to assist the “Society of the Last,” her mother's odd evangelical group in a musical mission. they hold forth on the beach, but heathens throw sand into Miss Jewbury's accordion; she loses her F sharp. (Oranges has some of the best examples I've ever seen of older women characters who are nuanced, nurturing, and know how to survive). Part One ends as the looney Christians go off the deep end. The plots in Part Two not only gel, but thicken into a horrifying climax. Now teenage Jess meets the winsome Melanie, who works at a fish stall. They are immediately stuck on each other and, over a fish carcass, the schoolgirl crush is off and running. Jess is a great kisser on Saturday night and Sunday morning finds her locking eyes with Melanie singing “He Touched Me” at service. But the word is out among the faithful; Jess and Melanie are damned if not doomed. In saving them from the evils of lust, the Christians reveal themselves as true torturers. The heroic Jess triumphs over her situation and finally gains enough distance from her past to create a future for herself. This landmark lesbian film is certainly the best—if not the only—initiation story that is positive and mature in characterization and plot, helped by the playful and quirky score of Rachall Portman. Winner of the 1990 San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival Audience Award for Best Feature.
