Tara Nicole Steele (Holly Near), the troubled, overweight eighteen-year-old daughter of airplane magnate Willy (Charles Aidman) and his vain wife Astrid (Jennifer Jones), leaves her coming out ball with kinky rock star Bogart Peter Stuyvesant (Jordan Christopher). Bogie introduces her to his new band, which has yet to choose a name, consisting of Joe (Lou Rawls), Santoro (Roddy McDowall), and Anna Livia (Davey Davison), who is seven months pregnant. When Tara introduces the band to her family, things go downhill.
Angel, Angel, Down We Go contains examples of:
- Awful Wedded Life: Tara's parents look down on each other and are constantly fighting because Willy is a homosexual and Astrid starred in stag films.
- Big Beautiful Woman: Astrid thinks Tara is ugly and unlovable, but Bogie thinks her weight makes her sexy. At one point he sings "The Fat Song," about how great fat girls are.
- Female Gaze: Tara stares at Bogie as he sings onstage, resulting in a close-up of his crotch.
- Grand Staircase Entrance: Tara descends a staircase during her coming out.
- Heartbreak and Ice Cream: In her coming out, Tara wolfs down a table full of eclairs when confronted by Bogie and her own sexual frustrations.
- Horror Hippies: The re-release title was pointedly chosen in the wake of the Manson murders.
- Keep Away: Bogie grabs a very expensive necklace from Astrid and tosses it back and forth with the band members, saying he'll give it back only if she goes skydiving with them.
- Look Both Ways: Tara flees her coming out party at night and runs onto the dirt road where Bogie is driving. Surprisingly, he doesnt' hit her - instead, she runs into the side of the moving car and falls over.
- A Minor Kidroduction: The beginning shows Tara as a young child, being yelled at and ignored by her constantly fighting parents.
- Named After Somebody Famous: Bogie was named, unsurprisingly, after Humphrey Bogart.
- Nature Abhors a Virgin: A rare female example. Tara is dismayed that she's a virgin at eighteen, thinking that she's so fat no one will ever want her. Of course, Bogie doesn't leave her in that state for long.
- Shower of Love: The movie opens with a flashback to Tara as a young child walking in on her father in the shower with another man.
- Thrill Seeker: Bogie uses unknown, underage Tara as his pilot when he goes skydiving with his band because that adds to the thrill of risk.
