Saturday Night Sharking

Rating: 6/10 (26 September 2006)

The career of John Travolta has had many ups and downs, but 'Saturday Night Fever'as where it really took off for the first time. The film is many things: a portrait of archetypal young people growing up under the influence of music (not unlike 'American Graffiti'); the story of a dance competition (like the later 'Simply Ballroom', although without that movie's wild comedy); and a portrait of New York's Italian community in the 1970s. One of the delights of this film is that Travolta's character is supposed to be cool, according to the standards of the time; but certain details now seem very dated, and one of the scenes set in a supposedly trendy club actually appears to demonstrate a form of line-dancing! There are subtleties here perhaps unexpected in a mainstream film, especially in the way the attitude of the male protagonists is at first apparently celebrated, but gradually revealed as atrociously misogynist; our attitude shifts with Travolta's, as his character grows up. As a pure dance movie, 'Simply Ballroom' is far more entertaining; but the edge of social, and human, realism raises this movie above the average modern Hollywood hit.