Sex, drugs and disco.

Rating: 6/10 (28 May 2016)

John Travolta busts out when he busts a move, and I finally watched this for the first time on Netflix. I'm pretty shocked that it's not really about dancing, and seems to be more about growing up with a little bit of rape and racism.
Summary: I didn't take notes or anything when I watched it, so I have to give a very brief synopsis. Tony (Travolta) is a dancing God in his neighborhood, and he can slay whatever woman he wants. He has loyal fellow Italian-American friends in his group, and they all have a little taste for a little bit of drugs, a little bit of racism, and a whole lot of disco, even if there isn't as much dancing as you would expect in the movie. When Tony decides to enter a contest as if dancing "is the ticket out of here," like most "teenager has to get away from home" movies have. He falls for his dance partner, but she won't have him. Somewhere along the way, racial turmoil between his Italian friends and a rival Hispanic group of friends escalates, and one of his friends- who is a devout Catholic- knocks up some girl, which of course is terrifying. In the final minutes of the movie, the younger friend commits suicide right after the other two friends take turns with the obsessed girl in the backseat of the car, raping her in a short scene where she cries and wishes Tony would stop it. After a fight with the wrong people, the rape, the suicide, and even trying to rape his own love interest, Tony finally realizes maybe it's not jive to act like he has been.
Review: I'm not 70's era guy, so I don't know how well the movie captures the essence of disco for sure, but I think the movie does a pretty good job. And it has the feel that all critically acclaimed movies from a couple of generations ago have- that feel of just telling a story, and just letting it unfold. The story itself lends to the overarching themes, rather than over emphasis on a scene or a line or a particular frame. And though there are some times where the scenes are sort of saturated to show how Tony gets a high from dancing, the story is a rather poignant representation of what I suspect life was like in the 70's. Races were still widely divided. Women were second to men. Youths made rash decisions, and rarely considered the consequences. Well, I suppose that's not so secluded to the 70's after all, some may say, which is why Saturday Night Fever can certainly be found to still be relevant.
Regardless of the "era," it is in those moments that choices are made that lives truly unfold. And life is rarely much different: from the 70's to the 90's to the now, being good at one thing (dancing) doesn't mean a damn thing when you're not being good for something.