“Grease,” first a Broadway hit and then a movie in 1978 starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, has recently been resurrected and is enjoying even more popularity than before. DVDs of the film are being sold wearing little leather jackets, a great marketing ploy, for sure.
Danny Zucko (Travolta) and Sandy Olssen (Newton-John) met over the summer at the beach, and fell in love. When they separated, Sandy believed she was moving back to her home in Australia and would never see Danny again. But then her family’s plans change, and she enrolls in high school in the states. As chance would have it, it’s the same school Danny attends, and she’s delighted to see him again. He, on the other hand, gives her the cold shoulder. He’s the leader of the gang called “The T’birds,” and he doesn’t want to lose face in front of the guys by admitting how gaga he is over this girl. He blows her off, breaking her heart, and his as well.
Thinking that she’ll fit in if she becomes cooler, Sandy joins a girl gang called “The Pink Ladies,” who introduce her to smoking, drinking, and getting her ears pierced. She also starts dating a jock. Danny thinks that if he becomes a jock, he’ll have a better chance of winning Sandy back, so he goes out for sports and eventually earns a letterman’s sweater. The ending sequence shows Sandy with her hair frizzed up to the sky, wearing skin tight leather and slithering around, informing Danny, who is wearing his sweater, that he’s the one she wants. If they had just been themselves in the first place, they could have been together through the whole film, but no – they had to completely change their entire personalities in order to bring it about.
I had issues with this film for many reasons. The first, I just mentioned. Sandy was a clean-cut, nicely dressed girl at the start of the film, but she doesn’t get her man until she starts dressing like a streetwalker. This sends out a negative message – girls have to wear skitight clothes in order to get guys.
Additionally, a major part of the dialogue is centered around girls’ bodies, body parts, and what those body parts are used for or could be used for. I kept hitting fast forward, trying to avoid some of those conversations, but found that they were coming thicker and faster than I could keep up with. And it wasn’t just the guys – the girls were equally as bad. I found this really surprising in a movie that was only a PG.
It’s true that a lot of fun music came from this movie. “You’re The One That I Want,” “Hopelessly Devoted to You,” “Beauty School Dropout,” and “Go Greased Lightning” were all featured. But I would recommend that you get the soundtrack by itself and don’t worry about watching the movie. It’s scene after scene of talking about sex, thinking about sex, bragging about sex, and then fixing up a car, for the purposes of getting a girl, for the purposes of sex. I was extremely unimpressed.
Related Blogs:
Let’s Talk About Celebrity Births
Olivia Newton-John’s Heartbreak
Music Selections for Better Fitness