MIDDLE-AGED MATINEE! #7 - 'Footloose'

'Footloose' (1984)

Welcome back to "Middle-Aged Matinee!", the review article where I'm taking a look back at films from the year of my birth, 1984! Today, I take a look at a film that wants to be a teen drama, a teen dance film, a straight drama, and an MTV-inspired music video. Let's get to it and, as always, I hope you enjoy the article!

“He’s a big-city kid in a small town. They said he’d never win. He knew he had to.”

This extremely cheesy ‘80s tagline could be found on the posters for “Footloose” and it perfectly foreshadows how cheesy the whole affair is. I do remember watching this movie when I was a kid and I actually remember enjoying it. However, unlike other ‘80s films (some of which are even cheesier than this film, admittedly), I couldn’t really enjoy “Footloose” this time around.

Now, the movie is not the worst thing out there by any means. There are some great dance sequences and I was also intrigued by John Lithgow’s character, Reverend Shaw Moore. His character is the reason why there is a ban on dancing… Oh, yeah, the story! I almost forgot to mention it.

'Footloose' was a star-making movie for actor Kevin Bacon.

In “Footloose”, Kevin Bacon’s Ren McCormack has just moved to Bomont from Chicago. Ren quickly learns that the small town has a ban on rock ‘n roll music and public dancing. He learns that the main person behind this is Shaw. He also learns that the girl he’s infatuated with, Ariel (Lori Singer), is Shaw’s rebellious daughter.

Eventually, Ren decides to challenge the ban on dancing in order to get a high school dance put together. He has a lot of opposition from the town including being abused by two cops for playing music in his car and there is also Chuck (Jim Youngs), a terrible human being that doesn’t have much to offer the film except being a generic villain for Ren to face in the third act.

So, back to Lithgow’s character. There is an actual character here and Lithgow’s performance is pretty much top-notch. Shaw is not just an antagonist for the sake of being an antagonist. His character has genuine concerns for the spiritual side of his congregation. He also has a deeper, more personal reason for why he has gotten the town to ban dancing.

Of course, the movie is remembered for the dance bits and the soundtrack. Kenny Loggins was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song and the movie was a massive hit in ‘84, grossing over $80 million. Despite the film’s highlights, though, I think I understand why it didn’t quite work for me overall.

The movie wants to be multiple things and while it does well with some of them, there are other elements that just don’t work. On one hand, it wants to be a hip, MTV-inspired teen movie. Then, in the next scene, it wants to be a schmaltzy romantic teen film and after that, it wants to try and be a genuine drama.

At the end of the day, it’s a mess of a film. If it had stayed with one of the many genres that it tries to be a part of, it may have been a better film… even with the ‘80s cheese that exists within the movie’s very DNA.

'Footloose' has too much of an identity crisis for me to be able to recommend it in spite of some good performances and some decent dance numbers.