First released in 1984, Footloose now enjoys the same sort of semi-ironic nostalgic cachet as John Hughes' contemporary schlock-fests about angst-ridden teens with silly hair. This is partly due to the fact that, as breathtakingly predictable kids-against-the-squares romps go, it's really pretty tolerable, but it's mostly because of the soundtrack. The songs that appear in the film--notably Kenny Loggins' infectiously vapid title track, and gale-force screecher Bonnie Tyler's excruciating "Holding Out for a Hero"--are possessed of an awfulness so monolithic that they... have transcended their era and become reliable floor-fillers at 80s nostalgia discos all over the western world. The plot, such as it is, sees the eerily androidal Kevin Bacon playing a hip rock & roll youth from the big city rebelling against the strictures of the conservative small town in which he finds himself living. Inevitably, he falls for the daughter of his nemesis, the local preacher (the latter, it has to be said, is played with some aplomb by John Lithgow, who very nearly wrings depth from a character otherwise straight out of the colour-by-numbers guide to movie-making). Inevitably, there are some dance sequences. Inevitably, the kids win out, and the grown-ups realise that maybe they aren't so bad after all. On the DVD: Footloose can be watched on disc, should you so desire, dubbed in German, Spanish, French or Italian. There also subtitles available in pretty well every European language, as well as Arabic, Hebrew, Russian and Turkish. Other than that there are no extras. --Andrew Mueller [show more]
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Please note this is a region 2 DVD and will require a region 2 (Europe) or region Free DVD Player in order to play. Teenager Ren MacCormack sends ripples through Bomont, a small Midwestern town that could stand some shaking up, when he arrives from Chicago with his mother, Ethel, to settle with her relatives. The adults tend to view him with suspicion as a possible contaminant from the outer world. Some of his male peers eye him as a threat, and most of the girls just plain eye him. It's a tough time for Ren, whose father deserted him and his mother, leaving them financially and emotionally strapped. But Bomont is a new setting, a place for beginnings, and Ren intends to give it every chance. He finds that the town is autocratically run by the local minister, Rev. Shaw Moore, who single-handedly manipulates the community sentiment and has had a hand in the banning of certain books, all rock 'n' roll music, public dancing and numerous other enjoyments that Ren had taken for granted in Chicago. From the moment he arrives in Bomont, Ren is harassed and ostracized. He immediately finds himself in conflict with the community, in a unique relationship with the minister's free-spirited daughter Ariel and involved in a feud with her bullying boyfriend Chuck. His greatest ally turns out to be Willard, a good-natured schoolmate, slow to wit but quick to fight. Eventually, Ren galvanizes the youth of Bomont to confront the town's narrow-mindedness, and, in doing so, he forces Rev. Moore to re-examine his own relationships with his daughter, with his congregation and with his wife of 20 years.
Ren McCormick (Kevin Bacon) is a city kid who moves to a Bible Belt town where dancing is banned by the local hell-fire preacher. Ren defiantly hoofs away in a series of spectacular sequences. The title song was nominated for an Oscar and the film also features the track 'Let's Hear It For the Boy'.
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