Movie Review: 'Acid Test' is a Terrific Coming of Age Riot Grrl Tale

Acid Test is a coming of age drama set in 1992. It’s about a teenager on the brink of a future that includes Harvard, a good job, and a career. Of course, she begins to question this path and that question provides the plot of the movie. It’s a journey of self discovery that will take the main character, Jenny, played by Juliana Destefano, from straight A student to Riot Grrrl feminist willing to experiment with psychedelics as an escape from her troubles.

Jenny’s father, Jack (Brian Thornton) has had Jenny on track to go to Harvard for years. Jack himself is a Harvard graduate and that makes Jenny a legacy, and more likely to be able to get into the school on a scholarship. Jenny however, as she’s grown up she’s grown disillusioned about whether Harvard is her dream or her father’s dream. Jenny finds a new path via a trip to a concert where she hears the punk rock of a band of Riot Grrls and has an epiphany about being able to make choices for herself.

Meanwhile, Jack does himself no favors by slowly drifting into a fugue state depression. Jack is moody and aggressive and has begun to scare his family. Jack and his wife, Camelia (Mia Ruiz), have begun fighting loudly every night and when Jack sees Jenny beginning to change her clothes and question his authority he grows ever more volatile and unpredictable.The father’s plot is a little underdeveloped but Thornton is effective as a menacing and troubled presence.

Attending another Riot Grrl concert, Jenny spends time with a guy from school named Owen (Reece Everett Ryan). Owen considers himself an outsider but he’s really a spoiled rich kid slumming with the poor kids. Nevertheless, he’s cute and funny and when he offers Jenny some acid to drop during the show, Jenny is more than willing to be talked into trying it. What comes from her first trip are even more revelations, joys, and new ideas. Acid opens Jenny’s mind even further and leads to more defiance at home.

Acid Test was written and directed by Jennifer Waldo and is an expansion on her 2017 short film of the same title. It’s also based on Waldo’s own life experiences. Waldo grew up in Washington D.C in the 1990s and after discovering the band Bikini Kill at a concert in 1992, she had an experience just like the one Jenny has in Acid Test, an emotional and intellectual awakening to feminism and popular entertainment that would become part of her life. This gives Acid Test a strong sense of place and authenticity that really stands out.

The father-daughter scenes in Acid Test are filled with intense energy. It’s a conservative father versus a growing progressive teenager and the conflict plays out against a background in which Bill Clinton is rising to power as the next President of the United States. The film makes a point of dropping in references to the election year including references H. Ross Perot and George H. W Bush’s campaign failures. That divide between father and daughter mirroring the growing political divide is a strong dramatic device.

Speaking of Bill Clinton and the election of 1992, I loved the authenticity of the 1990s aesthetic of Acid Test. It’s just the right amount of nostalgia for flannel and chunky boots without ever tipping toward self-parody. One of the incredible things about the punk-Riot Grrl aesthetic is that it remains timeless to this day with punks still mirroring the vibe of bands like Bikini Kill, L7, and Babes in Toyland. It provides a specific yet timeless place for the movie to exist.

Go see Acid Test at the Dances With Films Film Festival in Los Angeles, on Saturday, June 18th, 2022.