EARLY MOLLY

A never-before-seen blast from Molly Ringwald’s (not too distant) past is coming to the screen--”P. K. and the Kid,” filmed when Ringwald was 14 (she’s now 18). It will hit Denver in November, the rest of the country in January.

Filmed after she did “The Tempest,” and before she became John Hughes’ favorite leading young lady, it’s the tale of a young girl named P. K. who hits the road after her stepfather (Alex Rocco) beats her and “hits up on her.”

She winds up meeting an arm-wrestling champ called the Kid (Paul Le Mat), who comes to care for her in a kid-sisterish way. Mel Maron, marketing-distribution president for Castle Hill Productions, called it “a road picture, also a race against the clock--he’s got an arm wrestling championship to get to, and she’s trying to get away from her stepfather--who’s following her.”

OK, but is it any good?

Said Maron: “It’s not gonna win any awards, hon, but it’s pleasant.”

Ringwald, through her rep, told us: “I was 14, it was my second project, and it’s dated. It’s just not a good picture.”

According to director Lou Lombardo, known as a film editor (he did “All the President’s Men” and lots of Sam Peckinpah and Robert Altman titles), Ringwald got “about $75,000.” Now she’s getting as much as $1.5 million.