| The Cast of Characters: |
 | Tony Manero (John Travolta). A cocky, obnoxious asshole, John Travolta reprises his character from Saturday Night Fever. Pretty much a perfect storm of repulsive here, despite the depth he had in the original. Just to put things in perspective, at one point his character gets dumped for Frank Stallone. |
 | Jackie (Cynthia Rhodes). Tony's long-suffering sort-of girlfriend who's also a dancer and singer. Puts up with Tony way past the point where most people would have just clubbed him to death with a shovel. The most likable character in the movie, even if she is mind-bogglingly spineless. |
 | Laura (Finola Hughes). Wealthy British dancer who's just as unpleasant and unlikable as Tony. I'd call her an ice queen, but that really doesn't even begin to describe how amazingly off-putting this character is. |
 | The Bee Gees. No, they don't appear in the movie, but they did do most of the soundtrack, and their songs are omnipresent. For an hour and 36 minutes. I repeat, one hour and thirty-six minutes of the Bee Gees. |
 | John Travolta's Crotch. Believe me, there are enough close-ups of Mr. Travolta's package that it almost becomes a character in and of itself. |
We've covered the bad career moves of John Travolta twice before here on the Agony Booth, making him a Three Strikes Repeat Offender. Several brave souls dared to endure the shrieking, burning hell that is Battlefield Earth, and our fearless leader Albert took on Moment by Moment, a film so incredibly syrupy that you could pour the prints over your waffles.
And now, I once again venture into the world of the one man who can snatch failure from the jaws of success with more finesse and enthusiasm than Darryl Dawkins throwing down a slam dunk.
After the misstep of Moment by Moment, Travolta rebounded with two pretty good films: Urban Cowboy and Brian DePalma's Blow Out. By 1983, however, he had veered off track yet again. Two of a Kind was a botched attempt to rekindle the chemistry he had with Olivia Newton-John by sticking them in a romantic plot about convincing God not to flood the earth again, or some crap like that. And that same year offered another, much bigger disaster from our dimple-chinned wonder: Staying Alive, the sequel to Saturday Night Fever.
For those of you who haven't seen the first one, here's a brief summary. Travolta plays Tony Manero, a young guy who doesn't get along with his family, and is stuck in a dead end life with rotten friends, living in Brooklyn and working at a paint store. His only solace is at a disco club, where he regularly wows the clientele. Much dancing, rowdiness, and tragedy ensue, but there is a glimmer of hope at the end.
The movie was one of the smash hits of 1977, and a pop culture phenomenon. The soundtrack became the biggest selling movie soundtrack ever, and the film was even edited down from an "R" to a "PG" so everyone could get in to see the re-release in 1978. It made a star out of John Travolta, and also, for better or for worse, the Bee Gees. Basically, if you ever hated disco—and god knows that describes a large segment of the planet's population—you can blame this movie for extending its lifespan by a few years.
This brings us to 1983, and a coming together of two of the biggest stars in Hollywood. At the same time Travolta's career was on the rise, another up and comer was making a name for himself. In 1976, a little movie called Rocky made Sylvester Stallone a star, and proved that good looks and the ability to speak coherently aren't necessary to becoming a leading man. Capitalizing on the success of Rocky, Stallone directed a little-seen wrestling film called Paradise Alley.
This, coupled with the dynamite year Stallone had in 1982, starring in both First Blood and Rocky III, made it easy for Stallone to get himself in the directing chair again. And not only did he direct Staying Alive, he also got a producing credit, as well as a writing credit for doing his own "polish" on the script. It's not often you can blame a guy three different ways for a awful movie when Kevin Costner isn't involved.
Not to take anything away from Sly, but directing has never been his strong suit. His debut was middling, and apart from the boxing stuff, Rocky II was a rather dull and plodding soap opera, and Rocky III was only good either when something boxing-related was happening, or Mr. T was on screen. Much as I love the guy, the nicest description I can give for his directing style is "heavy handed", even when the movie ends up being pretty damn good.
As for this film, it fits right in with the '80s trend of MTV-inspired musicals. Yup, it belongs right in the same genre as Flashdance and Footloose. That genre being two-hour glorified music videos draped over a paper-thin plot. Staying Alive also takes a character from a gritty character drama and throws him into a standard backstage musical-type melodrama. And with Stallone at the helm and at the pen, the movie eventually turns into another Rocky movie, only instead of two sweaty guys punching the hell out of each other, we get a bunch of sweaty people dancing.
The movie picks up six years after the original film, yet Tony seems to have not changed at all. And the stuff that made the guy likable-yet-troubled at age 19 just makes him an asshole at age 25. It really blows a huge hole through the entire film, because even when Tony was a jerk in the first one, there was some depth to make you believe there was more to him. This film tries to do the same thing, but fails miserably.
The movie begins with neon purple credits (why, yes, this is an 80's movie!) that inform us this is a Robert Stigwood production. So we're in good hands here. Well, not really, because this is the same guy who gave us Grease 2 and made a movie of Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band without the involvement of any of the Beatles. If you haven't seen the latter movie, just ask a Beatles fan about it. And make sure you have some sedatives on hand when you do. They'll thank you for it later.
After the less than reassuring "A Sylvester Stallone Film" credit, a rock tune plays behind Tony Manero (John Travolta) and a bunch of extras auditioning for a musical. Just to get this out of the way, the song is "Far from Over", which became a big hit for none other than Sly's kid brother (and another Three Strikes Repeat Offender), Frank Stallone. We'll get back to him and the song later. Oh, believe me, will we ever.
The credits play over Tony and his fellow hopefuls as they dance that sort of spastic Broadway-style interpretive dancing that looks like a cross between The Jane Fonda Workout and an epileptic fit. Tony is looking quite a bit more buff than the last time we saw him. The reason for this is that Sly got Travolta into the gym before filming, and got him pumped up. I mean really pumped up. He may not be Schwarzenegger in Pumping Iron, but compared to how he looks today, it's damn impressive. Needless to say, the film will take every possible opportunity to show off the results of Travolta's time at the gym.
As Frank sings, "This is the end!" (if only we were so lucky), the title of the movie blasts out at us, all glittery and shiny. Kurtwood Smith can be seen briefly as the choreographer, and good lord, I really wish he had a larger part. Believe me, this film would be ten times more entertaining if it were just ninety minutes of him telling John Travolta he's a dumbass.
"Geez, get a load of these dumbasses!"
The dancers are being cut from the audition one by one, and there are far too many package shots than I'm really comfortable with. This is only the beginning, however; We'll be getting many, many more shots of John Travolta's "area".
This goes on for a while, and really the most interesting thing I can tell you is that, according to the credits, the costumes in the finale scene were designed by Bob Mackie. Mackie also did extensive work on The Carol Burnett Show, but is probably best known for that dress Cher wore when she won an Oscar. Given what we'll see in the finale, I'd imagine you're better off not mentioning this film if you ever meet him.
Also, I hope you like the Bee Gees, because the music in this movie is mostly divided between them and stuff by Frank Stallone. And yet, the soundtrack was still a huge seller. Hell, it even hit #1 on the charts in Switzerland. Make of that what you will.
Enjoy this clip of "Far from Over" in the opening credits of Staying Alive.
As the credits wind down, Tony goes off script for his audition, and gets cut. You know, this would have been a great time to give Kurtwood Smith some dialogue. Sure, the rest of the film is going to have no shortage of people telling Tony he's an asshole, but why not start now? Tony walks off and "Far from Over" mercifully comes to an end.
