The TAXI DRIVER of disco musicals

Rating: 9/10 (8 September 2007)

I believe that Saturday NIGHT FEVER in its original 118 minute R+ version is genuinely one of the great dramas of the 70s, a film so severe, that I liken it to TAXI DRIVER in its relentless scathing depiction of NY life in the 70s. When first released in Australia in 1977 it was the full, full on, foul mouthed vicious version that I astonishingly saw in free to air TV in Sydney last night (on a 9.30pm slot). This R+ version had not been seen here for almost 30 years and only existed in its PG re release that played endlessly as a double feature with GREASE thru the 80s. Amusingly that is exactly how it played last night with GREASE prior at 7.30pm. All that aside, SNF with its scalding expose of the lives of these 20 somethings is a superb film, and for all those moaning about it not being fun because it is a musical... well it is not supposed to be fun... it is a damning comment on the uneducated and ignorance of the lives depicted. If you seek a fun musical then see STEP UP which is NY similar but nowhere as courageous and fully realised as this film. In 1978 with underage fans screaming to be let in, it was considered smart to cut 10 minutes out, dub over all the swearing (especially the two times Travolta says 'c*nt' in the same sentence, all the references and scenes to car sex...) and make it PG friendly... and it certainly was a success. But if you want a "Scorsese version" as originally released, and you can tell drama from drivel, then this full R+ version is for you. I have never seen a better damning of an uneducated bunch of cruel insensitive people in any film... and if there is a moral to this cinematic thrashing... it is that if you are not educated then you will end up like this lot. Brit director John Badham has drawn well from the equally vicious portrayals seen in the 'kitchen sink' dramas made in Britain in the early 60s like "Saturday Night And Sunday Morning" or THIS SPORTING LIFE where the working class who are bogged in their ignorance keep returning to an emotional bruising cycle of behaviour until one just plain stops and looks at himself. Like Tony does in this film. I also believe the scene with Karen Lyn Gorney and Travolta in the empty apartment they consider renting is one of the great moments in any American film (she is sitting on the window sill). This is a great film, uncompromising in its depiction of that 'lifestyle' cornered through ignorant mean-ness into delusion and nowhere. Perfectly realised. then cut to a PG. See the original.