Flashdance (1983)

User Rating:

5.6/10   

Director:

Adrian Lyne

Writers:

Thomas Hedley Jr. (screenplay) and
Joe Eszterhas (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

15 April 1983 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Romance | Music

Tagline:

Every day, she works in a man's world. Every night, she dances through the universe that is her dream.

Plot:

A Pittsburgh woman with two jobs as a welder and an exotic dancer wants to get into ballet school.

Plot Keywords:

Dancer | Dreams | Steel Worker | Dance | Ballet School

Awards:

Won Oscar. Another 10 wins & 13 nominations

Cast

Jennifer Beals	...	Alex Owens
Michael Nouri	...	Nick Hurley
Lilia Skala	...	Hanna Long
Sunny Johnson	...	Jeanie Szabo
Kyle T. Heffner	...	Richie
Lee Ving	...	Johnny C.
Ron Karabatsos	...	Jake Mawby
Belinda Bauer	...	Katie Hurley
Malcolm Danare	...	Cecil
Philip Bruns	...	Frank Szabo (as Phil Bruns)
Micole Mercurio	...	Rosemary Szabo
Lucy Lee Flippin	...	Secretary
Don Brockett	...	Pete
Cynthia Rhodes	...	Tina Tech
Durga McBroom	...	Heels

Runtime:

95 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints) | Dolby (35 mm prints)

Certification:

Iceland:L | Netherlands:6 | Canada:R (Nova Scotia) | Argentina:13 | Australia:M | Canada:AA (Ontario) | Chile:18 | Finland:K-12 | Peru:14 | Singapore:NC-16 | Sweden:11 | UK:15 | USA:R | West Germany:12 | South Korea:18

Filming Locations:

Carnegie Institute - 4615 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

Paramount held dancer auditions for a proposed sequel to this film. That film was never made.

Goofs:

Continuity: During the first dance number ("He's a Dream"), there is a three-second cutaway to the audience, and when we return to Alex, the pull chain for the water-dump has appeared from nowhere. Later in the dance, another shot from a similar angle shows that it has disappeared again. We know that Mawby's Bar didn't go to the unlikely trouble of elevating the chain out of sight except for the time when it was needed, because if they had, the sudden movement would set it swinging, and we don't see that.

Quotes:

Frank Szabo: You girls eat like pigs.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Saturday Night Live: Paris Hilton/Keane (#30.11)" (2005)

Soundtrack:

I'll Be Here Where the Heart Is

Some may call it heavenly in its brilliance, others are just entertained

Although I've long known, generally speaking, what this movie is about, I never saw it when it came out in 1983 or 1984, because I was too busy "living" the 80's (yeah, right, whatever that means!). But I just saw it recently, in its entirety, the other night on TV.

I don't know, maybe it's the current sorry state of affairs of the world today that made me want to watch this film, just so I could revisit the "happy days(?)" of the eighties, when, although the world was also in a sorry state of affairs, at least there was an underlying pretense of hope and glory, a pervasive (albeit childlike) adherence to the belief that wishes DO sometimes come true, miracles CAN happen, and for every ugly frog there IS a beautiful princess waiting to kiss him...

This movie sucks, bigtime... but it also rocks! And that, people, is the honest to God truth. This movie is so bad it reeks of the stench of the very phoney-baloney on which it is based (and we all know how awful THAT is). BUT, it also rocks you to your very soul, and hey, how can you possibly fault a movie that dares to offer people (and not just young people, but ALL people) that little thing called HOPE???

I hope you don't take my "critique" the wrong way... Honestly, I don't think the movie is really all that good, but the message, and the feeling, and the spirit of this movie, are all very wonderful and infectious indeed and should NOT be discounted. It makes it a wonderful movie. Strange, isn't it? If those of you reading this are parents with up-and-coming kids, make them sit through this film!! Make them watch it!! I guarantee you, at least there is not a single scene in it where some teenager just HAS to have sex with a baked pastry object!!

Finally, let me comment on the fact that many in filmdom have dissed Jennifer Beals over the fact that a stand-in dancer performed various or several of her dance segments. Well let me just mention, that at the very end of the film, in the credit roll, there is a disclaimer that states: "The people and events in this film are fictional. Any similarity to actual people or events is unintentional." So, with this in mind… a stunt double performed some of the dance steps!?? I was shocked, shocked to find that stunt doubles are used in Hollywood!!