Dirty Dancing Movie Review

I used to love Jennifer Grey when she had her own nose on her face in the 1980s; it was cute, it gave her character, and it suited her. Now, I don't always recognize her face on the video boxes and she's indistinguishable from so many other ingenues of the 1990s. For the long summer of 1987, Grey and co-star Patrick Swayze epitomized romance as they danced together all night long. It's set in another place (the Catskills) and time (1963), when teen agers still spent summers with their parents at resort hotels in the country. More accurately, Dirty Dancing is 1963 grafted onto 1987, because the music and the dance styles are from the later era. But female audiences identified with Grey's character, and empathized with her discovery of the universal truths about that age in that rarefied atmosphere. Dirty Dancing isn't a perfect movie, but it's a very pleasant way to spend 97 minutes. Emile Ardolino also directed 1992's Sister Act.

1987 (PG-13) 97m/C Patrick Swayze, Jennifer Grey, Cynthia Rhodes, Jerry Orbach, Jack Weston, Jane Brucker, Kelly Bishop, Lonny Price, Charles “Honi” Coles, Bruce Morrow; D: Emile Ardolino; W: Eleanor Bergstein; C: Jeffrey Jur; M: John Morris. Academy Awards ‘87: Best Song ("(I've Had) the Time of My Life”); Golden Globe Awards ‘88: Best Song ("(I've Had) the Time of My Life”); Independent Spirit Awards ‘88: Best First Feature. VHS, LV, Closed Caption, DVD