Toe-tapping fun, until the plot starts

Rating: 4/10 (13 March 2020)

Coming of age movies in high school are often a tough sell for me. They have to include characters that I connect with on a deeper level in order for me to enjoy them. Grease is overloaded with characters I find obnoxious and annoying. These are all the "cool" kids who value how their friends see them over being a good person. What infuriates me even more is that the film seems to think that Danny is correct for not wanting to be real, and that Sandy should change her entire personality so she's cool enough to be with him. The other plots aren't any better, including a pregnancy scare, and a girl who is too dumb for beauty school (yet somehow she will be able to handle high school.) Also, I just have to mention, I hate that the only intelligent person in the film is presented as a stereotypical nerd and is mocked mercilessly.
It's just too bad that the music is so darn fun. I want to hate everything about Grease, but I can't help singing along. I love a good musical, but it's rare for me to enjoy the music in one so much more than the plot itself. Even the choreography and sets for the songs all accentuate the playful joy of the music. This is why Grease is a soundtrack that I own, but a movie that I never wanted to own. It's a shame because there are great scenes built around the songs, and yet they have to combine it with all this terrible plot in between. It also makes rating and ranking Grease a nightmare. Within any given 15 minutes of the movie there are at least a few minutes where I'm having a good time, so I should rate the whole thing highly. Yet, so much of what I like about movies is the plot, and this is a plot I'd rather never see again. In the future, I think it's best if I stick to the soundtrack and avoid the movie itself at all costs.