54 (1998)

If you put Cocktails and Boogie Nights together you get 54. Wait Boogie Nights came out just before 54??!!! Another one of Hollywood's tricks to make a similar movie. Yes Mike Myers played a great actor. His laugh, LOL!!!

I guess people are reviewing this movie as compared to around 1998. We seem to remember a lot of the great movies (depending on who you talk to) were like late 70's early 80's, the godfathers, and the star wars and so on. But seriously the 90's made some really hard core classics that the quotes are still around today. Forrest Gump, people still quote that. That movie was 1994. Saving Private Ryan, then you have Schindler's List, Titanic was 97. So when this movie came out you pretty much were up against the 90's and big name movies.So I can understand how this didn't leave a good taste in peoples mouth. Plus all the talk of the late 70's and early 80's, which is still my favorite decade of music. I agree with every one about Michael Myers character. It was simply off the chain. You could tell he prepared for his role. And honestly I don't know how Steve rubell acted in real life. And frankly it doesn't matter, mike Myers still performed great.Salma Hayek was just a beauty. A pure beauty back then and probably is now. Older or not. Great person to show in this movie. This was the decade of some drop dead gorgeous women with natural looks. The Pam Griers, farrah Farcetts, who ever played that girl in night rider, wonder woman, and all the charlie's angels. You name it those girls knew how to look good. Frankly in 2017 I'm not impressed. But to find some one in 1998 with that kind of natural beauty wasn't easy either. She played the part very well. Although her part wasn't as big as it should have been, it was definitely key to this movie.Ryan part in this movie as Shane was all over the place. Probably where people had a hard time relating to. I mean they didn't really talk much about his family. And they played the whole dad was a drunk and didn't care about my life theme too much. As a matter of fact I wish directors would quit playing that scene out. Its old and pretty much the characters who play it in movies don't do it right. The dad just seemed out of place as well as the sisters.Now that I think about it, Ryan shouldn't even have been the main character. He didn't really live up to the 70's and early 80's and Nev Campbell is hardly convincing of somebody who "is doing what it takes to get on top". And I'm not sure if they cut out a lot of sex scenes but for the late 70's early 80's they needed a lot more sex and drugs. As matter of fact this movie if it was made in the early 80's would have been great.All the other characters honestly aren't worth talking about. And I have to be honest. I love this movie. But its more like a guilty pleasure. If I'm writing an honest review of the quality of the film and acting. Its not very well for what they could have had. Where they were suppose to give an account of a bar where anything went. Sex, drugs and just simply a lot of questionable behavior. They simply went on about a bartenders life and how he got be at studio 54.They should have just had the show focus on Myers and how he was the owner of the bar and what kind of business deals was he in. Would have been much more interesting. Or simply recast the character, make tom cruise play the part of Shane and then go far on about how salma and who ever played Shane were having an affair and then honestly ditch Nev and go with Denise Richards and that would have been a hit.But they didn't. Its still a show worth watching. I love watching it, but it could have been better. I remember that decade from 75 to 85 as the greatest and most unique when it came to music and just experimenting with fun. The movie makes it seem like pretty good but boring at times with a bunch of people just trying to make it and falling in line when they are told. I didn't grow up in that decade, so maybe it was like that. But that doesn't stop people from making the 50's into pleasantville now does it?

This is "Goodfellas" meets "Valley of the Dolls", a deliciously trashy example of the dark side of night life that is legendary even today. Oh, the many ghosts I've felt walking through the doors of the former disco, now a legitimate Broadway theater that transitioned from nightclub to stage with the classic German expression of decadence, "Cabaret". Nightclubs still have a strict door policy like this, but 54 made it famous, even if it wasn't the first. This thrives on the disco beat of the late '70s/early '80s, tossing in obvious corruption from behind the scenes from a manager who was ingenious in many ways but idiotic and careless in a ton of others. "I've been to a marvelous party", Noel Coward wrote, but as his muse, Elaine Stritch, admitted, some of those marvelous parties really weren't so marvelous.It's a fantasy land that makes reality tedious, and for bar-back turned successful bartender Ryan Phillipe, that marvelous party turns out to be the key to the door to his possible destruction, turning him from a basically decent kid from Jersey City to an absolute phony. As for Michael Meyers' Steve Rubell, well, I don't like to speak ill of the dead, but he was as sleazy as they come, never realizing the self destruction his doomed success has him headed towards.I have to call this a guilty pleasure, a fun bad movie, and a reminder of my own party days which in many respects, as a whole, were not really marvelous. Ellen Albertini Dow, one of the cutest of little old ladies, is unforgettably lovable as Disco Dotty, a fictionalized version of a real character, and all she's missing is the cat and the birdcage to be a dancin' granny with a Tweety bird. The narration by Philippe gives this a pedestrian feel, with a feeling of nostalgia that lasts as long as the club stays open, but the feeling of sleaze has the same impact as a Sunday morning hangover. I may not be able to read minds, but I do know the difference between classic art and a framed poster that ends up in the trash after its owner realizes its true value. But for those of us who were there for lights and beat, this is a nice memory that soon is as forgotten as one of those cheap book store posters.

When I first watched this movie, I just knew it would be one of those films I would watch every couple years and it would never grow old to me. This made maybe my 10th viewing and I still enjoyed it.Studio 54 in the late seventies was THE place to be, clubs weren't as relevant as they are nowadays and even so 54 was the kind of place that people off the streets could hang out with movie stars and rock singers, anyone who was anyone had to be there. It was ran by a man named Steve Rubell and he was somewhat of a god in that world. Everyone wanted to be his friend, and he just wanted money, sex and drugs. He was embezzling money from his own company and not letting the IRS find out about it, but when word got out his place was shut down quickly and he went to jail.Ryan Phillippe plays Shane, a character based on Tieg Thomas, a bi-sexual party boy who became a bartender and a star because of his time at 54. Shane however was straight and fell in love with a soap star on this movie and he and the girl he falls for have to realize that life and love is more important than selling yourself out.Side note...there is another director's cut of this film out there based more on Tieg's life having lots more sex and bisexual encounters, director Mark Christopher may release it anytime, he got lots of clearance for the DVD release, but there's still lots more to be seen on DVD.Mark did a really great job directing this movie film and with all the lights and action going on in the club he captured the right things at the right times, his use of slow motion is perfect. He is mostly famous for doing gay cinema and shorts like those seen on the "Boys Life" series, and his work here far outshines those.Acting wise this was a gem. Ryan Phillippe is a good guy, I have met him and he's such a great guy in person that I could never judge him on film, but I will say he did a great job and thats not biased, he's nothing at all like the cocky Shane character he played here and he did good with the Jersey accent. Mike Myers may have did his best acting job ever here, we've all seen him do these crazy characters such as Austin Powers but here he's playing a real person and this movie is not at all comedy and he pulls off a serious acting job, it is so hard to believe this is Mike Myers. Neve Cambell also did her best work here in my opinion, early in her career but trying to play an older more sophisticated Jersey girl in the New York circle. Other great actors included Breckin Meyer, Heather Matarazzo, Ellen Dow and Sela Ward. Salma Hayak was the balance though, that girl cant act in a movie unless Robert Rodriquez is directing her.Of course disco was the music of this time, and I thought the music here was very fitting, the songs were as important as anything when one of your stars is the club and the dance floor. Nice original music too, and glad to see a Bachman-Turner Overdrive thrown in the mix.Great movie I recommend it to drama lovers, bio-pic lovers, disco lovers and just anyone looking for a way to kill an afternoon enjoying a film. 6 out of 10 stars.