Grease

For this year’s Valentine’s Day movie review, I was thinking of reviewing another musical, but this time, one that I am not a fan of at all. The 1978 musical, “Grease.”

From the looks of it, time hasn’t changed the class of Rydell High. They still look like they’re 30. Jeffrey Westhoff said in his review, “Or maybe teenagers in the '50s really had crows feet and receding hairlines.”

One thing people can note is that John Travolta adds depth to cool guy Danny Zuko. Watch the look he gives with Stockard Channing’s Rizzo after she shows Sandy, played by the late Olivia Newton-John, at the bonfire. Channing’s talents have been more obvious in other films, particularly “Six Degrees of Separation.” Her acting in this film is as good as Travolta’s, but her singing isn’t. Rizzo’s main song, There are Worse Things I Could Do, should be a huge hit, but isn’t. One happy surprise is to find the funny ability of Eve Arden, who plays Principal McGee.

She says the terrible line, “If you can’t be an athlete, be an athletic supporter,” and turns it into one of the film’s funniest lines. Westhoff said, “Others may be able to dismiss "Grease" as bubble gum entertainment, but I can't get past the "conform at all costs" moral.” Sandy sells out her own identity to keep the boyfriend, a boyfriend who has spent the film hiding her from his friends. No matter how playful the music, the terrible message remains of changing your identity for the one you’re in a relationship with.

I know that a lot of people love this movie, but I first saw a little bit of it when I was in seventh or eighth grade. I never bothered to go back and watch it until years later, and I didn’t like how peppy the girls were, the going back and forth of the relationship between Danny and Sandy, and half of the songs I didn’t like. Originally, Henry Winkler was supposed to be cast as Danny, but he didn’t want to be typecast, especially since he played the same character in “Happy Days,” so we got Travolta instead. Still, I don’t think that would have saved the movie from being just average.

Surprisingly, this film was such a hit that they had planned three or four sequels and a television show. What we got, was the 1982 atrocious sequel, which is one of the worst ever made, “Grease 2.”

Felix Vasquez started his review by admitting, “When I was a kid one of my favorite movies on constant rotation was “Grease.” It’s still one of the most entertaining movies I’ve ever seen, and downright spectacular adaptation of one of the most interesting stage musicals ever introduced to audiences. Upon discovering there was a “Grease 2,” I was ecstatic. Another chapter to one of the most bad @$$ movies ever made? It’s too good to be true. It was during the middle of the opening number to “Grease 2” that my excitement dropped down to an immediate disappointment and I struggled through what is easily one of the cheapest and worst sequels ever devised.”

It was tough to follow “Grease,” but they could have at least tried. Everything about “Grease 2” is cheap. The title lacks imagination, the performances are downright forgettable, and (besides the school faculty: Arden as McGee (this was her final role), Sid Caesar as Coach Calhoun, Dody Goodman as Secretary Hodel, Dennis Stewart as the leader of the Cycle Lords, and Dick Patterson) the only characters who return are Didi Conn as Frenchy and Eddie Deezen as Eugene. Some continuity, and it’s made clear in the first film that Frenchy had to repeat her senior year because she dropped out of beauty school, but the sequel takes place two years after the first film. What happened to Frenchy, did she fail three times or did she just decide to go back to school when she turned 20? As I already mentioned, Stewart is back as Leo, but it becomes weak when you see he’s a biker who looks like he’s in his 20s trying to beat up a group of 14-year-olds.

“Grease 2” lacks everything that made the original film iconic. Everything about it spells the 80s, despite the film supposedly set in the late fifties to early sixties. What doesn’t help is that every song is either very forgettable or memorable for being very bad. Vasquez said, “I honestly can’t remember a single song in the film save for “Cool Rider.” Granted, Michelle Pfeiffer is immensely beautiful, but a singer she is not. She makes Stockard Channing seem like Whitney Houston. I can only imagine Pfeiffer’s children singing “Cool Rider” to annoy the ever loving crud out of the actress whose admitted embarrassment for this role in the past.”

The writers make the sequel as a smart flip of the coin and in actuality, it’s just horrid. This time, there’s a very proper British student named Michael, played by Maxwell Caulfield, who falls in love with Pfeiffer’s (in her film debut) character Stephanie who is a rowdy leader of the Pink Ladies. Much like Sandy did to win over Danny, Michael begins changing himself to win over Stephanie. And besides a sudden change of clothing, he takes the entire film to make himself over for Stephanie. Vasquez described, “He does this by purchasing a motorcycle and learning how to ride it like Evil Knievel, and becoming a masked bike rider who appears to help the Pink Ladies and T Birds in their ongoing feud with a local biker gang who begins terrorizing them.”

Result: Stephanie begins to fall in love with the masked rider. See the change in the formula? Vasquez said, “It’s so trite, it’s nauseating. There’s also the sad fact that Maxwell Caulfield and Michelle Pfeiffer not only have zero chemistry, but also fail to muster up the charisma that Travolta and Newton-John had with one another. The supporting cast also fails to register as remotely memorable, as they play nothing but background players for sub-plots that go nowhere, and a finale that never quite matches the big number in the school carnival.” As a sequel to “Grease,” it’s terrible, and as a musical on its terms, it’s completely abysmal. “Grease 2” is a failure on every level and is one of those tacky memories that is fondly looked back on while laughing because, like “Staying Alive,” it’s just so horrendous it couldn’t possibly have existed.

I think everyone can guess this film is one of the worst sequels ever. It was the same story except the plot was slightly altered and the roles were switched. How could anyone have liked this sequel? Patricia Birch, the original film’s choreographer, directed the sequel. I bet she must feel ashamed. Just do yourself a favor and avoid this sequel, especially if you loved the first film. This film will just make you feel dirty when you see it.

Apparently, there was going to be a second sequel and Olivia Newton-John had confirmed but she sadly passed away almost two years ago. In 2019, a prequel was announced, and I know they made a live television special on Fox, and a show that appeared on Paramount+ last year, but that got canceled and withdrawn from public availability. Who knows if they will ever try to resurrect this again, but we’ll see. I know there is a huge fanbase, but I am not a part of it, sorry to say.

I want to apologize for the late posting as I fell asleep when I came back from work and had some stuff to do before I wrote this up. Now that I have, stay tuned Friday for the next review in “Black History Movie Reviews.”