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Summer loving
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Grease
1978 | 110mins | dir: Randal Kleiser | starring: Olivia Newton-John, John Travolta, Stockard Channing | Available from Amazon
reviewed by
Kate Ferguson
uploaded: 26-05-2004
Most weeks we recommend a film that's on tv. But occasionally, we like to revisit old favourites. This week it's the turn of Grease. Its appeal is undeniable 26 years on from the film’s debut, but what is it that makes this musical timeless?
It certainly isn’t the plot, which is slim at best: boy meets girl; boy loses girl; boy wins girl back; boy loses girl again by going for a sly grope at the drive-in and dancing with the town slut at the school dance; girl realises she loves boy enough to forgive said groping and flirting, and to wear skin-tight leather; and everyone lives happily ever after (oh, and Sandy and Danny’s car goes airborne).
No, the real joy of Grease is the songs. Even years of them being played (usually in the form of the "Grease mix") in terrible nightclubs during the cheesy eighties hour between midnight and 1am, often accompanied by club employees leaping up on the bar to demonstrate their own version of the T-Birds’ Greased Lightning, has not diminished their charm. Some prefer the soppy love songs sung by Sandy and Danny. The majority think that Rizzo and Kenickie were far cooler, and long for the action to stay with the Pink Ladies and the T-Birds. But if anyone claims not to know the words to Summer Lovin’… well, would any of us really believe them?
Sigh at Sandy’s undying romanticism. Thrill to the pre-Scientology Travolta hip-wiggle. Swoon (if you must) at Kenickie’s all-encompassing obsession with his car. Whether you’re watching Grease for the songs, the dancing, the level of crudeness that you probably didn’t understand the first time you saw the film, but certainly picked up on when you hit your teens ("What’s your name, beautiful?" "Marty. Maracino. As in cherry."), or simply for the joy of watching The Oldest Teenagers in the World ™ in action, there’s no doubt that Grease was, is, and ever shall be the Word.
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| "Tell me about it, Stud": Sandy
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| 9/10
For nostaliga purposes, it really can't be beat! And yes, John Travolta was sexy once |
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