Do the mashed potato

Rating: 7/10 (23 December 2014)

Dirty Dancing was a sleeper hit that launched a phenomenal hit album. It is now regarded as a romantic musical classic. Some of the songs from the film have become unforgettable hits and the dance moves are now much mimicked.
The film is set in the Catskill mountain holiday resort in the summer of 1963. Dr Houseman and his family are taking their annual three weeks holiday there. The youngest daughter Baby has taken a shine to the dance teacher, Johnny Castle who introduces her to a more wild style of dancing that the entertainment staff get up to.
When Castle's female dance partner falls pregnant by one of the waiter's, Baby gets some money for her to have an abortion which gets botched and she has to go to her father to help her out. Her father is angry and forbids her to have anything do with Castle and the rest of the entertainment team. However she continues to see and learn to dance with Castle and they fall in love.
The film is cheesy with some predictable plotting and a few bad lines including the now infamous, 'nobody puts Baby in a corner.' It has some hissable characters such as the immoral waiter and wannabee doctor who is dating Baby's sister and who knocked up Johnny's dance partner and then washed his hands off her. There is also the slimy nephew of the holiday camp owner with his constant veiled threats against the camp staff.
Given all that it is still an enjoyable film now ripe with nostalgia and some cracking songs. Jennifer Grey is vulnerable enough and she has a good chemistry with Patrick Swayze. But this is really Swayze's film, he dances, he broods, he sings and he steals the film.
Dirty Dancing shows a world that is changing something Dr Houseman wants to resist with his regular holiday at the Catskills with his daughters. Even the camp owner has realised that times are changing as young people want to go to Europe rather than spend a few weeks at the camp. The dance teachers are bored of the sedate dance lessons when they know that they are capable of more hip and happening dance styles and of course Vietnam war is round the corner. Its almost a final visit to a fading lifestyle and an emergence of a new youth culture that Dirty Dancing celebrates.