Sweet Revenge
(Dandy, the All American Girl)

by Vincent Canby, New York Times

Dandy, the All-American Girl is a somber comedy about a footloose young woman, played by Stockard Channing, whose only desire in life is to buy an $18,000 Ferrari, which she attempts to do by stealing and selling other automobiles. Sam Waterston plays Le Clerq, the public defender assigned to Dandy's case when she is picked up on a charge of petty theft, and Franklin Ajaye is excellent as Edmund, the young black man who aids and abets Dandy and is the only person in the movie who understands her.

Dandy is not exactly a failure, though it's easy to understand why it failed to find an audience. It seems unsure of itself. It wants to sympathize with the ambitious, disturbed, inarticulate heroine but can't make her appear to be sympathetic, possibly because it never understands her as well as Edmund does, and he's no better at expressing himself than she is.