_54_ (R) * 1/2 (out of ****)
If there were a subject just screaming to be made into a film, it was Studio 54, the late Steve Rubell's infamous New York discotheque, which came to symbolize the taboo-smashing excesses of the disco era's heyday: easy drugs and even easier sex between everyone, all set to a thumping dance beat. So when Miramax started production on _54_ last year, the buzz of hype and resulting anticipation began: an edgy film as down-and-dirty as the club itself, written and directed by a promising first-timer (Mark Christopher) and starring some hot young talent (Salma Hayek, Neve Campbell, newcomer Ryan Phillippe, and Mike Myers in his dramatic debut).
My, how easily does the worm turn. Hype turned into damage control when word got out about 11th-hour reshoots (wrapped only a month ago), a rash of studio-imposed edits that left virtually the entire cast and crew (especially Christopher) unhappy, and the very likely possibility that Miramax would not screen the finished film for critics. At the last minute, though, Miramax did decide to screen the film (so hastily scheduled was the screening that Myers's last name was misspelled on the invitation, not to mention the numerous typos in the press notes) for a media audience that came away noticeably less than impressed, myself included. And with good reason--somehow, some way, the supremely disappointing _54_ has made the historically hip haven of hedonism... boring.
Although Christopher has distanced himself from the finished film, he still must shoulder some of the blame for _54_'s lifelessness. _54_ focuses, for the most part, on a tight-knit trio of employees at the club: coat check girl/aspiring disco diva Anita (a wasted Hayek); her busboy husband, Greg (Breckin Meyer); and, most prominently, the fresh-from-Jersey Shane O'Shea (Phillippe), who enjoys a quick rise from busboy to head bartender. These characters are about as generic as those descriptions. In focusing on the hired help, Christopher really missed the boat. With the exception of the flamboyant, always-woozy Rubell (Myers, in a well-modulated turn), the meaty stories to be told at Studio 54 are not the workers' but those of the people who went there to party; not necessarily the numerous VIP guests, but the wild eccentrics who managed to be picked from the crowd by the club's famously hard-ass doormen and dance (among other things) the night away with the rich, famous, and infamous (the only taste of the crowd comes by way of Ellen Dow's feisty Dottie, a disco- and drug-crazed granny, but she's a peripheral character at best). As such, aside from the expected overhead crowd shots, there is precious little actual _dancing_ in _54_. What is a disco film--especially one about the pinnacle of the movement--without the dancing? Even Whit Stillman's _The_Last_Days_of_Disco_, which wasn't so much concerned with disco as it was witty dialogue within a group of hip-to-only-themselves club-hopping preppies, featured at least one extended dance scene.
Dancing isn't the only thing glazed over in _54_--so is the sex, but that may not be entirely Christopher's fault. From what I've heard, his original vision was something considerably more dark and daring, starting with the Shane character: he was conceived (and actually filmed) as a wild, morally ambiguous bisexual, which would have made an efficient springboard to cover the pansexual pleasure palace aspect of Studio 54's legend. But somewhere between principal photography and the final cut, Shane was defanged and quite literally straightened out; consequently, so was the film. Aside from a brief glimpse of erotic encounters toward the beginning of the film, Shane's fleeting dalliance with seductive socialite Billie (Sela Ward), and an abbreviated bedhopping montage, the sexual dimension is just about ignored. Shane, in this incarnation, is sanitized to the point of blandness, an idealistic do-gooder who pines for a frequent guest at the club, Julie Black (Campbell), a worldly soap star with, yes, a heart of gold. This tacked-on "romance" would have been slightly less tedious if either Campbell or Phillippe made some connection with each other or the audience. They fail on both counts.
Ultimately, _54_'s failure comes down to three letters: F-U-N. As in, there isn't any to be had for the audience. Too much time is spent with the boring Shane, and too little is spent on the club floor, where all the action took place. Anyhow, though, whatever time is spent on the 54 floor is not used very effectively. When Anita finally gets her big break and perform onstage at the club, it should be a euphoric height, for her, the crowd, and the audience; however, the moment doesn't get a chance to reach that level, for it is cut short by a moment of forced sentimentality, which also mars the film's conclusion (one of the last-minute reshoots). Strangely upbeat and wistful, the resolution is wholly unconvincing and unsatisfying.
There is an interesting portrait of Studio 54 out there--two of them, in fact--but _54_ is not one of them. They're on cable TV: a couple of documentaries produced by E! and VH1. These two fascinating looks at the club and all the sordid goings-on within it show that there's still a great disco movie to be made. The problem is, after the critical and certain box office failure of _54_, the subject may have run its Hollywood course.
Michael Dequina
mrbrown@ucla.edu | michael_jordan@geocities.com
Mr. Brown's Movie Site: http://welcome.to/mrbrown
CompuServe Hollywood Hotline: http://www.HollywoodHotline.com
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews