Here, here! At least an 8! This is a classic! John Travolta's performance and on-screen chemistry with Karen Lee Gorney (and her performance too) were all nothing less than captivating! And John Travolta was unbelievable with his dance rhythm.
If it was full of explosions, cgi graphics, ridiculous dialogue and attractive actresses who are incapable of acting then it would most likely have that rating of 8 or better.
LOL. It doesn't get more lowbrow than SNF. If you think a movie about drugs, one night stand, gang violence and a rape victim getting insulted as a "C-word" is highbrow, you've got some serious mental issues.
Awww, that's so cute. Someone who only just saw the movie yesterday talking down to a person who's not only seen it multiple times in the past few decades, but actually remembers when that area of Brooklyn was exactly the way it was depicted on film.
Nice try, the first time I saw it was back in 1998 and I have seen it over and over and over again ever since then. Your pathetic attempt at a snarky comeback though was a good laugh I'll give you that.
"If you think a movie about drugs, one night stand, gang violence and a rape victim getting insulted as a "C-word" is highbrow, you've got some serious mental issues."
That's not what it's about at all and if you honestly think the film is condoning the things you listed then you're an idiot.
Your posts suggests you're one of those pretentious asses who has such a low opinion of everyone's intelligence, you think that when you "understand" something, no one else did, either. So then you go around misinterpreting everyone's comments as "not understanding" it, so you can--in your arrogance--"correct" them to prove just how smart you are.
So, let's try this again:
Earlier, someone made a snarky crack about how people don't like this movie because they prefer lowbrow crap loaded with CGI, ridiculous dialog and bad acting. Then I responded that this movie was also lowbrow. It exploited John Travolta's sex appeal after he became a huge sex icon after Welcome Back, Kotter (even going so far as to have him dancing in underwear). The dialog was loaded with vulgarity, and many of the scenes revolved around Tony and his friends' trashy lifestyle of one night stands, drugs, racism and gang violence. There's so much trashiness that Saturday Night Fever is just shy of being an exploitation movie.
I'm not sure on what planet you're on to think that because the movie has a "meaning" or a "message" to be understood, that this also doesn't mean it wasn't a low brow film that used sex appeal and a sleaze factor to attract audiences. Or that if someone points out the sleaze factor, this means they didn't "get" the film.
No, YOU didn't get it. Saturday Night Fever was not Ingmar Bergman or Akira Kurosawa. It was 100% mass market, mass appeal movie that in some ways pandered to the lowest common denominator.
"The dialog was loaded with vulgarity, and many of the scenes revolved around Tony and his friends' trashy lifestyle of one night stands, drugs, racism and gang violence"
That's the point you idiot, we the audience are not supposed to sympathize with his Bay Ridge lifestyle and we are supposed to support his decision to move on to another life away from all that crap. You REALLY don't understand this. The movie was supposed to be sleazy, Robert Stigwood was trying to portray a very immoral and dirty lifestyle and give a character who was born into that lifestyle something called a "character arc". The world isn't all sunshine and rainbows, one night stands, drugs, racism and gang violence actually do exist.
Tell you what little girl, why don't you just stick to Grease, you'd probably like that a lot better. I'm not being a pretentious ass, I'm pointing out your inability to handle anything deep or thought provoking and that's fine if you can't but don't come on here and try to say the movie is bad because you don't understand it. There is SO much more going on with the characters than what is revealed through their dialogue which is what I think is the true reason why you don't like it, you don't enjoy thinking. So then to justify your inability to comprehend the film you attack it for it's subject matter which is very immature on your part.
You've just been atomicgirl'd. Her argument always boils down to "I'm older than you so I must know more." But she's wrong again. I'm as old as she, and the movie didn't cash in on Travolta's "underwear" from Welcome Back, Kotter. His fans at that time were primarily kids -- but SNF was a real rated R movie for adults. It blew up with adults b/c it captured the zeitgeist --ie, it nailed a subculture, great soundtrack, the dancing, and marked the evolution of John Travolta from kiddie tv idol to movie star. That's when he became a "huge icon". It only crossed over broadly once the "edited" PG version came out to soften it for the younger crowd. That's when kiddie Kotter fans got to see it.
She didn't like the movie b/c she hated the moment in time and its locally borne subculture (she and I live in the NYC area) -- but she misses the theme entirely, and you'll notice that she does that a lot. She likes/dislikes then creates a house of cards logic in order to rationalize why you'd be stupid not to agree with what's really just her emotional knee jerk reaction disguised as analysis and argument from "I'm older" authority.
Yeah that’s what I noticed and if the film was just trying to cash in on seeing Travolta in his underwear you’d think we see that for longer than 70 seconds , she’s dumb
SNF is like The Lords of Flatbush and Cooley High but better. It's a "Time to grow up" movie and it deserves to be mentioned along with all the iconic films of the 70's. It's smarter than she suggests and there's much more going on -- artistically -- than disco dancing.
And what's great about it is that it's subtle and vague enough that you can have many interpretations about what it's saying and it leads to interesting conversations
It spoke to a lot of people for the wrong reasons. To this day, most people who fondly remember this movie only do it because it ironically glamorized the very things about disco that it was trying to bash.
Well I think anybody who watched it would see similar things happening in their own lives: drug use, burned out dreams, homegirls getting dogged out, dancing, having a crew, gang fights, the “one true love”.
I mean yeah it’s cool to view that era with some cool mystique but everyone knows it had its faults just like anything else. Not the movies fault. Just human nature.
That's not why everyone loved it (because it was relatable to them).
Look at the sequel (Staying Alive). Why was the sequel about Tony trying to break into broadway as a professional dancer? Wasn't the whole point of Saturday Night Fever of showing a guy who falls in love with the dance scene and then giving it up later because he was using it to avoid facing responsibilities and growing up?
But then in the sequel--after the movie emphatically shows him quitting disco and dancing so he can make something better of himself--it has him going right back into dancing. Why? Because people loved and idolized Travolta as a sexy "dance king" so much that they didn't even care about the message the movie was trying to say about disco and Tony's life. They wanted more of the same (to see Tony up on the dance floor).
No it’s about a guy who was born into a lifestyle that he decides that he doesn’t want to grow old in so he makes the decision to better himself and break away from it (of course a certain troll on this board will somehow interpret that as playing the victim)
Just because SNF was a huge cultural phenomenon, it doesn't mean it's a cinematic masterpiece. I too think that 6.8 is a little too low, but I don't think it deserves an 8.0., either. A 7.0 is fair.