The Fake Life - Love movies? We do too!

Monday, May 07, 2007

Dance!

In Spider-Man 3, Peter Parker turns up at the jazz club MJ is singing at and, to humiliate and upstage her, hijacks her song with a dance routine. And all around the Internets it was as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. I feared something terrible had happened. It turned out it was just that a lot of geeks just think dance sequences aren't cool. They are wrong, of course. I love it when a dance breaks out in a movie, and doubly so if it is unexpected. So, here we've compiled a list of our favourite dance sequences in non-musical films. And a 1 and a 2 and a 3 and a 4...

Boogie Nights (1997)
d. Paul Thomas Anderson

The shot starts with porno-stud Dirk Diggler in the middle of a crowded dance floor, disco-ing away. Then, over the course of a minute or so, all the other dancers start copying his movies until the shot evolves into a choreographed dance scene with Dirk at the centre of it all - the coolest man in the room. It expresses both Dirk's rise to the height of fame and popularity, and the romantic and deluded fantasy of the 70's just before the 80's turn up, William H Macy considers a future starring in Wild Hogs, and everything goes to shit. Funky.

As a further point, I always think of this scene when I watch the bit in Starship Troopers when our hero is walking towards wash-out lane when war is declared and all the soldiers in the background start to run off to the left to find out what happened. It's another bit of sly choreography designed so that you almost don't notice it the first time. Most excellent, but the infantry don't wear polyester flares, so fuck them. -- Andrew Clarke

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
d. John Huston

The jig Walter Huston cuts is a perfect expression of his old coot character. For those at home, The Prospector is done by dancing about on your heels and toes while hollering "You got gold fever! I've seen it a hundred times, con sarn it!" -- Chris Oliver

The Return of the Living Dead (1985)
d. Dan O'Bannon

WARNING: NSFW!

"Trash is taking her clothes off again!"

Once again, it's the buildup that makes the scene, as Quigley reveals her fantasy of being eaten alive by a gang of old men, working herself up into a frenzied lust that can only be relieved by writhing her nekkid ass to cheesy 80's synth pop. But don't get all holier-than-thou, man! She's just holding a mirror up to your sick society! -- Chris Oliver

Last Tango in Paris (1972)
d. Bernardo Bertolucci

Ah. Again, the figurative title becomes literal towards the tail end of Bernardo Bertolucci's masterful sex-o-drama. A drunken - and deliciously brilliant - Marlon Brando drips with a sophomoric charm as he playfully flirts and woos his way into the arms of his object of lust (Maria Schneider). The tango itself, a beautifully expressive dance of form and refinement, is completely undone with, of all things, the emotional honesty of Brando and Schneider's fucked up but deeply passionate tryst. The broken but joyous dance becomes a microcosm of the lovers' relationship witnessed throughout the film.

And like any good post-drunken dance reprieve, the couple caps it all off with a nice little tug job. Unfortunately, the YouTube clip above cuts out right before it. Guga85, you fucking prude! -- George Merchan

We'll have the next part up very soon! Maybe!

NB: We were discussing doing this article before Spider-Man 3 turned up this weekend, honest, but who's to argue when a major motion picture plays right into our hands. Thanks, Sam!