I think it is time we revisit "Dirty Dancing" (1987) and the huge impact it had in Pop Culture

I love this movie. Swayze was a dream boat.

Sorry, but I did not like this movie at all. I was going to write something impolite, but this will suffice

R2 say it.

Is it considered a teen flick?

I remember seeing this in the theaters (I was 8) and later taped it off cable and watched it more times than I can count in the late 80s /early 90s. I can't recall seeing it since then and just recently re-watched it and still think it's just as enjoyable. The dialogue is kind of hokey, but the soundtrack is really what propels the film, as does the chemistry between Grey and Swayze. It's kind of wild how abortion was a subplot of this mainstream, PG-13 popcorn film. I suspect we've regressed where that's concerned and now it's treated as a third rail topic these days that very few films dare to touch. There's a lot of memorable moments, but I think the Mickey and Sylvia number is the most iconic:

It was the last of that cute nose. I miss her original nose even more than that of J Aniston.

NEVER seen the entire movie, in fact, just bits and pieces, even then i thought it was cheesy and NO ONE danced like that "dirty dancing" at that time period, doing all that bumping and grinding with each other! so silly and ridiculous!

although i do have a question about swayze's character, not sure if it was a fact or it was "alluded" to by was/wasn't his character a gigolo male slut toy for much older women when he wasn't dancing? that's the impression i got from the bits of the movie i watched years ago.

I saw it when it first came out and never much cared for it but it cannot be denied that the film has a large loyal following.

Why the fucking did they remake it for TV for fugally, fat, nicotine breath, tattoo Abigail Breslin.

This still from the re-make is hilarious - the leading man trying to lift her up out of the water is really struggling. Hahahahaha

The film isn’t set in 1987. It is set in 1963.

Definitely, r7. It's pretty much overtly implied that was the case. I think they steer the notion away from him being a gigolo though and imply he was just a young, horny guy who enjoyed the attention of older, sophisticated [rich]women and the monetary gain aspect is left ambiguous.

R9 True but it felt so 1980s.

I love how the production people didn't give a shit about hair and wardrobe and music matching the period in which the movie takes place.

Wait, didn't Lawrence of Arabia have a huge impact on Dirty Dancing?

The lake where the movie was filmed has drained away

R12 the writer of this movie chose the songs she wanted for the movie, and knew which scenes each song would play. It took them long to get each song as they had a $4 million budget and songs cost a lot. She wouldn’t have the movie without those specific songs, with the add on of the final song and Swayze’s song.

She also wouldn’t take out the abortion subplot despite getting pressure to from sponsors etc. she refused as she feels the abortion plays a big role in the relationship between Johnny and Baby.

The film originally received an R rating, so the Producer called the head of the MPAA (who she is friends with) and asked if she took some curse words out can it be PG-13 and he said yes. They knew the film wouldn’t be a hit without young teens.

[quote]NO ONE danced like that "dirty dancing" at that time period...

Netflix has a very good documentary ("The Movies that Made Us") about the making of the movie. Screenwriter Eleanor Bergstein discusses how much of the plot was lifted from her own experiences, including the dancing. Nobody danced in public like that, but she says that at the resort where her family stayed, there was a basement where employees would party after hours. When she described the "Dirty Dancing" that took place to Linda Gottlieb, who would eventually produce the movie, Linda said, "There's your title."

According to the documentary, nobody involved cared for the line "Nobody puts baby in the corner."

It’s known history Swayze tried getting them to remove that line or change it but they wouldn’t.

It was a stupid line, why would he be annoyed where she was sitting? Sitting in the corner means nothing.

Penny and Baby’s dad are the only likeable characters. Baby is a villain. She facilitated a back alley abortion just to impress some guy, lied and stole from her parents, did nothing when she saw her sister being assaulted by Robbie, got her boyfriend fired from his job by telling the world they effed (couldnt she have come up with a plausible lie for an alibi?), and was holier than thou about her Peace Corps intentions. Baby sucked.

R18, you cannot be that dense.

Baby was a cunt. I never liked her. Was so-so on the movie. Dwayne was fabulous.

Dirty Dancing is truly a chick flick made by women for women.

Ugh Swayze not Dwayne. Damn you autocorrect

I love how all the chairs and tables disappear during the final dance sequence.

it wasn't #1 for 19 weeks. I think Titanic was #1 for 16 weeks and that was a record.

Dirty Dancing made $63 million domestic. Which would be like $100 million today. Did twice that overseas. In terms of domestic box office, it opened at #4 its first week with 3.9 million and word of mouth kept it in theaters for months. Might have been in the top 10 for 19 weeks but I'm too lazy to look it up

adjusted for inflation, it earned $147 mil domestic.

I was in middle school at the time and this was THE movie with girls in my age group. They were obsessed with it.

It was the early 60s but a lot of it looked so 80s. Patrick Swayze had a mullet and Jennifer Grey had a spiral perm and poofy bangs.

[quote]did nothing when she saw her sister being assaulted by Robbie

Wait, when did that happen? I can't remember.

Fun fact: "I've Had the Time Of My Life" was offered to Donna Summer, who turned it down because she objected to the movie's title of" Dirty Dancing." Not a smart decision, as the song became a gigantic hit.

$147 million isn't that good today

It’s very good for a film in its genre.

Terribly overrated movie. Good for its time but cheesy watching it now. Gen x fraus iconic movie but as a millennia I don't see the fuzz.

But you see the buzz over all these superhero movies, huh?

I liked the movie because it reminded me of being a kid and driving up through Sullivan County NY to my grandmother's house. This was back when these places still existed in the Catskills and served the mostly Jewish clientele. There would be big billboards for places like "Brown's" where Jerry Lewis performed and many others like Grossingers, one of the most famous. The "Jewish Alps" or "Borscht Belt" eventually rather sharply declined and all these wonderful places are gone now but I was thrilled to see it brought back to life in this movie, even if it was filmed in North Carolina.

Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze actually hated each other, but you'd never know it by the chemistry they had in the movie.

That is because Grey is a big baby diva

Dirty Dancing - The Series!

R37 omfg I forgot about that

Fun fact - Kelly Bishop was an emergency recast for the part of the mother, as they had FIRED the original actress Lynne Lipton

Here she talks about being an emergency recast with no time to prepare

Why did they fire Lipton?

Probably a straight line from this movie to Mrs. Maisel

[quote] Why did they fire Lipton?

She got ill during the first day of filming, and the general feeling was she couldn't take the heat when filming on location.

I wanted to hate this film ,it's a very 80s film. I secretly love it.

R34, Sullivan County sounds dreadful.

It’s very 80s and WONDERFUL

R37: "Dirty Dancing - The Series!"

Nothing says "authentically Jewish" like Melora Hardin and McLean Stevenson!

What was the deal with Patrick Swayze's hair? It was feathered, so out of date for 1987--bot not so out of date that it evoked the 50s.

[quote] Ugh Swayze not Dwayne. Damn you autocorrect

That's not a valid excuse.

I’d rather watch Trump take a shit than revisit Dirty Dancing

R49 from the movie "romy and michell's high school reunion" "are you going to the reunion? i'd rather put this out on my ass! (garofalo's character cigarette) lol! lmao!...

It’s a fun movie. Some of you are so nasty

Both Jennifer Gray and Patrick Swayze were blessed with the epitome of the perfect physique. They were stunning to watch together.

R52: sorry but i found swayze a foppish "twig" hardly the "perfect physique of masculinity, maleness"... just me, but not ever remotely found him attractive, sexy or sexual..

jennifer was a pretty girl next door nothing more....

Wasn't it one of those examples of a film that was hugely successful on VHS?

It was hugely popular here in the UK and I was far too young to have ever seen it at a cinema, yet EVERYONE at school had seen it.

Didn't Jonathan Silverman from Gimme A Break! play Robby The Creep?

Will never forget dancing next to Patrick Swayze and a party.

As cheesy as the film is, it' has a very strong cast, I think Swayze, Grey, Cynthia Rhodes, Jerry Orbach and Kelly Bishop are all excellent.

For an '80s dance movie, I thought it dealt with the topic of abortion in a sensitive manner. It is a bit disappointing that Rhodes' character is pretty much side-lined in the second half of the film. I think Rhodes is quite an underrated actress. She was the best thing in the terrible campfest Stayin' Alive and she was very good here. Shame she retired once she married Richard Marx, who is now married to Daisy Fuentes.

Swayze and Grey are slightly above average looking. I think that's part of their appeal?

The movie was a Jewish girl's dream come true.

It’s no Rollertown.

He’s hot, she’s unconventionally cute. What’s not to like?

I imagine this movie set up a lot of disappointment for homely girls when the hot guy they were trying to pursue ran off with the hot girl.

Its a movie I can watch over and over and am never bored.

Movie came out in late August 1987, but I really had no interest in seeing it. Cheap dance movies really weren't my thing. But it stayed in theaters week after week after week. There was a lot of buzz about it.

Finally, sometime in November that year, I had time to kill and wanted something mindless to do. I was in a bad on and off again relationship and needed something to distract me from the misery of that relationship. A nearby theater was still playing Dirty Dancing, so I went to a bargain matinee.

I LOVED it. I was totally captivated by the story. Patrick Swayze alone was worth the admission price. But the music was great too. So many of the songs had been playing nonstop on the radio, but I didn't know where they came from until I saw the movie.

In fact, I loved the movie so much, I ended up going to it three more times before it finally left the theater.

1987? i was way way too busy watching "the barbarians" and "masters of the universe" and "who's that girl" for the monumental abundance of muscle, homoerotica and eye candy in the theater!

I hate WHo's That Girl

R66, well, i think it was funny but i went to see it a number of times in the theater and now i have the dvd for all muscle no brains handsome "buck" the UPS guy! his shirtless scene still gets be running! (i.e. leaking between the thighs)...

Swayze was quite the talented dancer!!! How the hell did a white actor from TX learn to dance so well?

Standard fare for the walmart crowd.

R68 Um, his mother owned a dance school.

He’s been dancing his entire life.

I love this movie

Me too.

Patrick Swayze was hot, but I never got into this movie. It doesn't stand out amongst all the chick flicks, to me anyway. Meh. I guess the general public disagrees though, considering how popular it is.

It's a movie of false hope and disappointment.

^^ Yeah, so it mirrors real life then, except in the movie they all lived happily ever after. Sounds like the perfect movie formula

I feel like it was the last true sleeper hit. It was out for months before it captured the zeitgeist. I remember seeing it in the theater months after it’s initial release, sold out theater and the crowd going insane. When Baby’s hand grazes Johnny’s ass while Cry to Me plays, the women went ape shit. The soundtrack was a blockbuster. It was one of the last true “audience” pictures. Perfect blend of 80s cheese while tapping into powerful baby boom nostalgia.

One last thing- when Jennifer Grey was on Dancing with the Stars shortly after Patrick Swayze died, she had to feign grief and like she was “doing this for Patrick.” What a horse shit.

R77 My Big Fat Greek Wedding and The Notebook say hi.

R78- with their iconic soundtracks as well? Fuck off.

You said the film itself was a sleeper hit. Those were also.

The Notebook (2004) debuted with $13 million and went on to gross $81 million.

My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002) debuted $597k and totaled $241 million