To set the tone, Kastner utilizes a fictitious framing device to trace the steady rise and swift decline of disco—three Mod Squad-type figures dressed in silver funky glad rags, sprinkling glitter onto a swirling mirror ball as they wonder around an urban landscape, and metaphorically pulling the strings that defined the period. As the three figures enact their plan to conquer American culture beginning at the outset of the ’70s, a series of interviews with performers (Gloria Gaynor, Martha Wash, Thelma Houston, Kool from Kool and the Gang, the Village People, etc.) and others who remember the impact of the music accompany the tour. These are interspersed with copious helpings of delightful retro footage, fleshing out the history lesson.
Kastner’s “secret revolution” thesis—that the ascent of disco into the mainstream subtly changed attitudes about sexuality, the women’s movement and African-American culture—comes courtesy of author Alice Echols’ book Hot Stuff: Disco and the Remaking of American Culture. (Echols is also on hand—and, frankly, seems a bit batty.) Yet the anecdotal evidence to back up this seemingly wacky theory—that Donna Summer simulating orgasms during “Love to Love You Baby” and K.C. and the Sunshine Band exhorting all and sundry to “Get Down Tonight,” for example—has plenty of facts and figures and makes perfect sense in retrospect. It wasn’t so much the music itself but rather the sudden prominence of the disenfranchised (gays, women, Blacks, Hispanics, etc.) who created and propelled it into the forefront that wrought long lasting cultural changes. One has to look no further than the mainstream popularity of gay icons The Village People as proof that disco brought Us to Them.
Love them or hate them, disco music and the hedonistic culture it spawned did make a lasting impact on American culture before its fall from grace at the end of the decade (which the film pinpoints as the moment The Knack’s “My Sharona” went to number one on the charts). Kastner’s movie tracks each and every step of the genre’s evolution with a soundtrack that, of course, pulses with an electricity and vibrancy that has never lost its power to enthrall. Though the kitschy framing device wears out its welcome, The Secret Disco Revolution is an affectionate tribute that is entertaining and surprisingly thought provoking.
Hollywood has always provided the greatest examples of the maxim “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” simultaneously producing multiple pictures inspired by the same subject or genre. In the last little while, for reasons that cry out for examination by cultural theorists, the major studios have released a spate of big-budget blockbusters that fairy tales insprired. (To be honest, Tim Burton’s phenomenally successful Alice In Wonderland kick started the mad dash to duplicate its success.) Reimagined for adults—kids are a secondary audience here—these movies have had mixed box office and critical success and are now finding their second life on featured packed Blu-ray/DVD combinations and VOD.
Although I had more than a few doubts about the miscasting of James Franco in the title role, Sam Rami’s Oz the Great and Powerful (Disney) is a visual stunner that manages to get past Franco’s phoned-in, condescending performance, thanks to its many positive aspects. The story, which follows the same trajectory as MGM’s The Wizard of Oz (replacing Dorothy’s journey with that of the Professor Marvel character) is a plus, as are the performances of Michelle Williams, Rachel Weisz, Mila Kunis and many others in the cast. Also, the technical aspects of the movie are matched by the enduring power of the Oz mythology over audiences. This is also a film that parents and kids can equally enjoy. The movie was a financial dynamo and a sequel is in the works.
Decidedly thinner but still visually dazzling and just as enjoyable in its own way is Jack the Giant Slayer (Warner Bros.), with Nicholas Hoult (Warm Bodies, A Single Man) as the cute-but-dimwitted hero, along with Ewan Mcgregor, Stanley Tucci and Ian McShane in a reimagining of the Jack and the Beanstalk story. Out director Bryan Singer chose this over continuing with the X-Men series (although he’ll be back for the next in the series). Due to the film’s so-so reviews and less-than-spectacular box-office take, he’s taken some media-drubbing but I found Singer’s movie, another good bet for both adults and kids, a delightful surprise.
The same cannot be said for Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters (Paramount), with Jeremy Renner and Gemma Atherton as adult versions of the fairy-tale siblings, now grown into witch killing merceneries. Charmless and violent in the extreme with too many gaps in logic to list, this fairy-tale reboot is hardly for kids—or adults, either. (Much more fun is the campy Who Slew Auntie Roo? from 1971 with Shelley Winters, which the fairy tale also inspired.)
The genre has also recently seen competing Snow White pictures: Snow White and the Hunstman—with Charlize Theron as the evil queen, Kristin Stewart as a tougher variation on the usual pure-as-the-driven-snow heroine, and Chris Hemsworth as the hunky huntsman who falls for her—and Mirror Mirror with Julia Roberts as the evil queen. I have yet to take in the latter but Theron’s icy performance alone makes the former worthwhile. (It, too, is getting a sequel.)