Product: Dirty Dancing (1987)
Rating: 4.0
THE TIME OF YOUR LIFE
It is awfully hard not to get swept up into the nostalgic heat and sentiment of this unabashedly, and well-done, teen romance. It is, by turns, sexy, funny, melodramatic, jamming (what with that soundtrack chock full of some of the best pop hits of the 60s mixed with a few great new songs) and campy. Yet the overriding feeling of melancholy and wistfulness, portrayed with real talent by Jennifer Grey, as the perfect Baby, transforms this movie into something lasting, something to really love. Cynthia Rhodes is absolutely riveting -- as usual -- in the second female lead; she is a spectacular dancer and electrifying whenever she is on the screen. The aching feeling of first true love/lust/whatever, here directed at hunky Patrick Swayze, who is by the way an excellent dancer, comes to full flower at a Poconos resort. As all manner of soapy subplots move through their predictable paces, we are treated to the transformation of our young heroine and any number of delightful musical numbers, capped off by the irresistably romantic Time Of My Life -- that feeling of moving through a romance that has somehow changed your life is captured with a rare sweetness, and it stays with you.