Not the worst film ever....

Rating: 4/10 (5 January 2019)

There are worse films out there. There are.
This one is a little like "Showgirls" in that 1) it is not a good movie; 2) it didn't do much for its star's career (although unlike "Showgirls" it wasn't a total career-ender); 3) the lead character is someone with serious temper/behavioral issues, who can be seen running into traffic after pitching a fit; and 4) Joe Eszterhas wrote the screenplay for both. The big differences are that "Showgirls" has better dialogue and is not boring, and its premise is more believable. It also has significantly more nudity and is rated "X," but the fact that we don't have to watch Nomi at confession makes up for that.
In this movie, Alex (Jennifer Beals) is an 18-year-old welder (?- how did she get that job??) at a steel company in Pittsburgh, and apparently rides her bike 40-50 miles every day. So she is very physically fit, but smokes. We don't know anything about her background or her actual family. She lives in an abandoned warehouse that has no other tenants but does have running water and utilities. She has a little old lady friend Hanna (Lilia Skala) who was once a ballet dancer. At night, clearly not wearied from her welding job, Alex dances at a local bar called Mawby's, where the dancers have fancy stage sets, fancy outfits, new routines every night, and don't have to take off their clothes. You know, a completely typical blue-collar bar. Her 35-year-old boss Nick (the luscious Michael Nouri) sees her dancing there and woos her, and eventually they decide to go out. Across the way is the evil pit of depravity called "Zanzibar" where the dancers have to abandon all hope and be naked, and is run by "Johnny C," who looks to be the poor man's version of Robert De Niro.
The movie tells us, "when you give up your dream, you die." Alex has dreams, as do her friends. One friend, Jeanie, is actually a talented skater, but messes up at a competition held at a poorly-lit ice rink. Nick says she will do better next time, but Alex informs him that there won't be a next time, without further explanation. I guess in this world, if at first you don't succeed, you are consigned to laying on your back on a table at the Zanzibar, allowing drooling drunks to eyeball your crotch as you move your legs in circles, until Alex shows up, drags you (mostly naked) out to the street, and yells at you that that isn't dancing. Another friend, Richie, wants to be a stand-up comic, and thinks the road to success is telling Polish jokes. At one point he takes off for Los Angeles to seek his fame and fortune, but apparently when he doesn't become a big star in 5 days, returns to Pittsburgh, more of a loser than when he left. Technically Jeanie and Richie are not deceased, but since they failed at their dreams and will never pursue them again, their drab future in their insignificant lives in blue-collar Pittsburgh is a metaphor for death. I do not know if this movie was very popular in blue-collar Pittsburgh.
At 35, Nick (Alex' boss) is a socially powerful millionaire, and is on the board of the "Pittsburgh Conservatory of Dance and Repertory," where Alex aspires to become a ballet dancer, even though she has no idea what is involved, and even though it bears absolutely no resemblance to any dancing she ever does. Or even any practicing that she ever does. When she goes to the PCDR to pick up an application form, she is standing in line with other people. They are wearing pointe shoes (really? to go get an application?) while she is wearing her clod hoppers. On her way through the building to get the application, she has to pass multiple ballet dancers who are extremely white, who are in what appears to be a museum hallway, practicing their bends, and apparently communicating with each other silently, perhaps with telepathy. To paraphrase Mozart from the movie "Amadeus": people so lofty they look as if they zh*t marble. The presence, and numbers, of these heavenly, taciturn creatures evidently intimidate little miss welder half to death, and she flees to Hanna's house, and lies about getting an application. Guilt over her lie causes her to go to church, and we are forced to sit through her awkward confession (not the only time in this movie, regrettably).
Nick discovers that Alex wants to be a ballet dancer, and using his clout, instructs the snooty applications office secretary (Lucy Lee Flippin) to make sure Alex gets an invite, which humorously almost causes the secretary to choke on her sandwich.
Well, there's a bunch of meaningless back-and-forth when Alex finds out that she didn't get the invite all by herself, yadda yadda yadda. But then Hanna dies, and as Alex tearfully holds Hanna's ratty old pointe shoes, she realizes that she actually has to make an effort to pursue her dream, and unlike her friends, can't just give up at the first sign of adversity. This of course leads us to the famous climax, where Alex dances for the PCDR committee. Although she doesn't dance ballet. But dadgummit she is going to show those pompous, cold people real, passionate dancing! Bring them out of their shells! Point at them in turn! Show them there is life and talent teeming outside of the silent marble halls which they inhabit! And indeed, after a false start, she has them tapping their toes, and even the snooty secretary is won over.
As I said at the beginning of this review, there are worse movies. This is just a lot of illogical fluff, and as others have pointed out, is really just music videos strung together by a weak story. Could have been worse, but it also could have been a lot better.