Saturday Night Fever [Blu-ray]

MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

John Travolta graduated from minor celebrity to superstar with Saturday Night Fever. Travolta plays Tony Manero, a Brooklyn paint-store clerk who'd give anything to break out of his dead-end existence. In life, Tony is a peasant; on the disco dance floor, he's a king. As the soundtrack plays one Bee Gees hit after another (including "Stayin' Alive"), we watch white-suited Tony strut his stuff amidst flashing lights and sweaty, undulating bodies. Tony's class aspirations are mirrored in his relationship with his dance partner, Stephanie (Karen Lynn Gorney), a secretary eager to move into the glamorous world of Manhattan. Saturday Night Fever's huge success grew meteorically thanks to the towering popularity of its soundtrack; during the first half of 1978, when the movie's disco songs saturated the singles charts up to four at a time, it was no longer clear whether the hit movie was feeding the hit songs or the hit songs were feeding the hit movie. This crossover between music and movies set the pace for many movies to come, as it also marked the rise and fall of 1970s disco culture. Two versions of this film exist: the original R-rated version and a PG version, edited down to more "family-friendly" fare and fed to the public with the tagline, "Because we want everyone to see John Travolta's performance." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

DVD FEATURES:

• Number of Discs: 1
• Audio: Dolby TrueHD
• Features:
  • Commentary by Director John Badham
  • Catching The Fever
  • A 30-Year Legacy
  • Making Soundtrack History
  • Platforms & Polyester
  • Deejays & Discos
  • Spotlight on Travolta
  • Back to Bay Ridge
  • Dance Like Travolta with John Cassese
  • Fever Challenge!
  • '70s Discopedia
  • Deleted Scenes

AWARDS

• Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

•     Nominated Best Actor - 1977 (John Travolta)

• Hollywood Foreign Press Association

•     Nominated Best Original Score - 1977 (Barry Gibb, Maurice Gibb, Robin Gibb, David Shire)
•     Nominated Best Original Song - 1977 (Barry Gibb, Maurice Gibb, Robin Gibb)
•     Nominated Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comed - 1977 (John Travolta)
•     Nominated Best Picture - Musical or Comedy - 1977

• National Board of Review

•     Won Best Actor - 1977 (John Travolta)
•     Nominated Best Picture - 1977

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

• Cast:

  
       John Travolta - Tony Manero
       Karen Gorney - Stephanie
       Barry Miller - Bobby C.
       Joseph Cali - Joey
       Paul Pape - Double J.
       Bruce Ornstein - Gus
       Donna Pescow - Annette
       Val Bisoglio - Frank, Sr.
       Julie Bovasso - Flo
       Nina Hansen - Grandmother
       Lisa Peluso - Linda
       Sam Coppola - Fusco
       Denny Dillon - Doreen
       Bert Michaels - Pete
       Donald Gantry - Jay Langhart
       Ann Travolta - Pizza Girl

• Director:

  John Badham

• Producer:

  Kevin McCormick, Robert Stigwood

• Screenwriter:

  Norman Wexler

• Cinematographer:

  Ralf Bode

• Composer (Music Score):

  The Bee Gees, Barry Gibb, Maurice Gibb, Robin Gibb, David Shire, Barry Robin

• Editor:

  David Rawlins

• Production Designer:

  Charles Bailey

• Executive Producer:

  Kevin McCormick

• Set Designer:

  John Godfrey

• Costume Designer:

  Patrizia Von Brandenstein, Jennifer Nichols

• Sound/Sound Designer:

  John Reitz, Les Lazarowitz, Robert W. Glass, Jr., John K. Wilkinson

• Makeup:

  Max Herriquez

• Consultant/advisor:

  James Gambina, Jo-Jo Smith

• Choreography:

  Lester Wilson

• Musical Performer:

  The Bee Gees

• Stunts Coordinator:

  Paul Nuckles

• Short Story Author:

  Nik Cohn

REVIEW:

• From the moment John Travolta strutted down a Brooklyn street to "Stayin' Alive" at the beginning of Saturday Night Fever (1977), music movies and pop culture were irrevocably changed. Unlike subsequent music blockbusters like Grease (1978) and Footloose (1984), Fever's depiction of one youth's escape at the local disco and tentative dreams for a better life in Manhattan astutely balanced galvanizing dance numbers with a gritty sense of contemporary economic malaise. Dance numbers, the Bee Gees soundtrack, and Travolta's white-suited presence, however, were the marketing hooks. With the release of Bee Gees singles timed to sell the movie and the movie becoming an ad for the soundtrack, Fever set the standard for marketing synergy several years before MTV, as the soundtrack became one of the best-selling albums of all-time and the film grossed over 100 million dollars. The once-underground disco movement turned into a late-'70s mainstream pop phenomenon; and TV idol Travolta, bolstered by an Oscar nomination for Best Actor, became a movie superstar and cultural emblem of the 1970s. While Travolta's career, like disco, suffered in the 1980s, his status was restored in the 1990s -- aided, no doubt, by '90s nostalgia for the '70s. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi