Saturday Night Fever

• Directed by John Badham
• December 16, 1977
• Based on the mostly fictional 1976 article Tribal Rites of the New Saturday Night by music writer Nik Cohn

A young man spends his weekends dancing and drinking at a local discothèque while dealing with the tensions and disillusionment of living in his working-class Brooklyn neighborhood.

Few movies become iconic immediately. Saturday Night Fever is that rare film that did just that. Maybe it is all that tacky 70s fashion done in polyester. So much polyester. Maybe it’s the music. Maybe it’s the awkward shots of John Travolta in his underwear combing his hair that go on just a touch too long. Or even the Travolta foot shots that possibly excited a young Quentin Tarantino.

The music is perhaps one of the best soundtracks of any film. Not only is it music that is firmly rooted in the era, but it is music that has transcended that time as well. Such hits as “Stayin’ Alive,” “How Deep Is Your Love,” and “Night Fever” all performed by the Bee Gees as well as “More Than a Woman” here performed by Tavares, “Boogie Shoes” by KC and the Sunshine, and “Disco Inferno” performed by The Trammps have all entered into the culture and continue to be heard on the radio and even pop up in other films and even on television. Then there are characters…

Tony Romero (John Travolta) and his pals are honestly pieces of crap. Tony is the best of the bunch but that’s not by much. He’s sexist and generally treats women slightly better than garbage. Tony is not a character you could put in a movie today. He’s young and a jerk but he’s not irredeemable. He’s a loyal friend and cares about his family even if he gets upset with them. He even is not a fan of racism.

Saturday Night Fever made Travolta a star. How? Because he turned a character that you should dislike into somebody you could at least empathize with. He’s verbally abusive to the various women he comes across and talks about them as if they are little more than vaginas to pleasure him and his friends, yet he’s rounded enough that there’s something about him that makes the character tolerable and even human.

Today though the totality of the male characters in this would be considered sexist and misogynistic. To a certain extent they are though I think at least Tony’s one friend Bobby C. (Barry Miller) who got his girlfriend pregnant could be viewed as just going along with the crowd. What strikes me is that this is clearly not a close group of friends. On the surface they get along and you can see why they hang out but it is a friendship based on the ability to have fun and not one of substantive personal connections

There’s some very casual pot smoking along with some other drugs alluded to if not outright stated. And even more casual pre-AIDS era sex. Somehow I don’t think I would want to take turns in the backseat of a friend’s car after somebody else already used it. That sounds exceedingly gross. But here they do.

And they run a train on the character of Annette played by Donna Pescow. That’s even worse than using the backseat after your friend used it. There’s a lot wrong with this movie that would make people freak out now. And that’s probably why people still pay to see it either by buying a physical copy like myself or stream it or rent it on streaming. It’s of its time and never shies away from that. It wasn’t something that was watered down to please a broad cross section of the public thus neutering the end result.

Despite the attitudes of the male characters, in the relationship between Tony and his dance partner Stephanie (Karen Lynn Gorney) she clearly has more control over what occurs than Tony does. She’s never submissive or desperate and perhaps that’s what draws Tony to her. He has a few women during the course of the movie throwing themselves at him, A thing most guys dream of yet the one woman that makes things difficult is the woman he’s after. 

Saturday Night Fever is a slice of life story. It’s about struggles and personal issues featuring individuals that are not the best of people. These are not upstanding perfect citizens but rather people with personal problems of varying degrees. It is a hard watch because those involved are not best. I am not calling the film bad. It just shows stuff that viewers might find appalling like the train I mentioned.

I do think the older I get that classics should be viewed once. Saturday Night Fever has great music. The fashions work even though they are ugly. And it’s engaging because it never shies away from what it wants to be.