Misleading Genre As It Plays Out Like A Comedy

Rating: 6/10 (1 December 2008)

Set in the late 1970's, Studio 54 is a trendy disco nightclub depicted in director/writer Mark Christopher's "54" which stars comical actor Mike Myers as the club's flamboyant kingpin and real life character Steve Rubell. But the leading star of "54" is Ryan Phillippe as a fictional Jersey boy Shane O'Shea with ambitions to seek employment in that club as he gets his feet wet into the establishment arranging tables as a busboy. Then as he progresses, much to the approval of Rubell, he gets promoted as a waiter and sugar daddy to the club's clientèle. Salma Hayek stars as Anita Randazzo, the club's coat check girl who's eloped to another busboy and roommate of Shane's, Greg Randazzo (Brecklin Mayer). Greg has his sights set on becoming a waiter, but due to his marriage commitments, he is deprived from his ambition, therefore making his dreams are sadly limited.
What makes this movie only average at best is that the agonizing struggles of these fictional characters is that it's been rehashed and been done several times before. Critics who have expressed their harsh disdain on "54" compared the plot and the story as the weaker sister to "Boogie Nights", which was more successful at the box-office. I get the impression that the critics claim that "54 steals most of their main ideas and themes, with only difference is that "54" is tamer than "Boogie Nights". While I agree to some extent that this movie isn't anywhere near perfect, and that there have been better disco-themed movies than this one, but what makes this film passable is that it has all the essential ingredients to make for a compelling movie. Unfortunately, the resources were not carefully featured.
In the case of Steve Rubell, his climb to success from a steakhouse proprietor to a highly successful club owner gets very meager notability, leaving most of his content in the dark, while the main plot is centered around these stereotypical failures as the struggle to climb the corporate ladder in the nightclub enterprise, which to me lacks any kind of depth to the movie. One of the questions that crossed my mind was how did Rubell emerged from running a steak house to owning club that Princess Grace and Truman Capote visited regularly? That should have been the core of "54". What about the aftermath of Rubell after his imprisonment due to his club being shut down via tax violations? That's where the importance of the movie should have been. Instead we are forced into watching overdone ego-driven hyper-extended melodrama with bare-chested men in tight shorts in a movie with an abundance of loose ends.
The acting as a whole was a snore casserole with a side order of yawn juice. But it's not entirely to be blamed by the actors, but perhaps due to the messy script. The big surprise comes from the performance of Mike Myers, breaking away from his comical roots to play an impressive portrayal as a restrained, but mysterious bar owner (I'm sure the real Rubell was more charismatic, if he was able to persuade Arab princes to his New York establishment). Salma Hayek is fun to watch as a coat-check girl who has aspirations to be a singer and paves the way for Shane into getting used to the customs and surroundings of the nightclub. It was a treat to watch the energetic geriatric Ellen Arbertini Dow get down and boogie as Disco Dotty (though her cussing was not all that necessary, even for an old woman). The scenery of this movie in terms of props and setting leaves much for one's desire.