Review of Saturday Night Fever

Okay, I was into punk not disco back in 1977, and held off seeing this movie on ideological grounds for many years. Perhaps if I'd seen it during its heyday it would have carried more weight, but when disengaged from the giddy heights of the disco era it does not travel well. This is basically 'Scorcese lite'; a sort of 'Mean Streets' done for teens, and missing out almost everything which made Scorcese's work so compelling. The viewer is faced with a parade of characters so stupid, self-centred and under-developed that it is virtually impossible to bond with any of them. Tony Manero is an idiot and his friends are even more moronic, whilst the girls are doormats (nice-but-dim Annette) or emotionally distant egotists (brash big-talking Stephanie). Add to this some downright unfathomable casting; Martin Shakar looks more like Tony's uncle than his brother (seriously, he looks a good ten years older) and whilst cast as Tony's crucial dance partner, Karen Lynn Gorney's ability is conspicuously 'school lunchtime disco'. Check the bit at the dance studio where she and Tony converse whilst she's practicing; it looks like she's been learning to dance for all of twenty minutes. Having said that, the dance scenes themselves are the high point of the movie, even if they are all Tony's show. In fact, there is an uncomfortable strand of narcissism and outright homo-eroticism to 'SNF' which is all in keeping with the essentially non-macho disco scene. With its falsetto vocals, elaborate studio-bound arrangements and invariably sex-obsessed lyrics, the music was made by producers, not neighbourhood bands, and the emphasis was on glitter and flash, not grit and trash. The dance scene's flamboyant, exhibitionist nature was far more in-tune with 'gay' sensibilities than the world of rock music, and so it was that disco suffered a boom-and-bust popularity over the late 1970s. 'Straight' society briefly sampled what the movement had to offer and then moved on to more gender-friendly cultural climes. By 1979 it was all over, and 'new wave' music was all the rage. Considerations of personal taste aside, 'SNF' is less than the sum of its parts, clumsily realised with characters who come far too close to being repellent without any redemptive qualities. It is all too apparently a vehicle for John Travolta, who served notice with his performance that his entire career would be based on slight variations on his 'Vinnie Barbarino' character from 'Welcome Back Kotter'. He struts solipsistically through 'SNF' wearing the exact same expression you see staring blankly back at you from a fish-shop window. Away from the dance floor, he could not carry the movie, which is a massive weak point since none of the other characters are as extensively written. By all means watch 'SNF' for nostalgia, for the dancing or the music or the actors, but not as a movie experience, because you will be disappointed.