GAS FOOD LODGING (1992)

GAS FOOD LODGING (R) Allison Anders directed this funny and moving independent feature about two teenage sisters (Ione Skye and Fairuza Balk) and their divorced waitress mother (Brooke Adams) living in the spare desert town of Laramie, N.M. The movie is really about the same thing Thelma & Louise was about: It's a portrait of working-class women betrayed and abandoned by men. Anders, though, refuses to turn her characters into victims, even when they're treated badly. She has made a comic ode to the joy of romantic possibility. Fine performances all around, especially from Fairuza Balk, who invests her role with a quiet emotional power that's rare to see in such a young actress. B+