Dirty Dancing (1987)

Spending the summer in a holiday camp with her family, Frances "Baby" Houseman falls in love with the camp's dance instructor Johnny Castle.

Director:

Emile Ardolino

Writer:

Eleanor Bergstein

Stars:

Jennifer Grey, Patrick Swayze, Jerry Orbach

Won 1 Oscar. Another 9 wins & 7 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Jennifer Grey	...	Frances 'Baby' Houseman
Patrick Swayze	...	Johnny Castle
Jerry Orbach	...	Dr. Jake Houseman
Cynthia Rhodes	...	Penny Johnson
Jack Weston	...	Max Kellerman
Jane Brucker	...	Lisa Houseman
Kelly Bishop	...	Marjorie Houseman
Lonny Price	...	Neil Kellerman
Max Cantor	...	Robbie Gould
Charles 'Honi' Coles	...	Tito Suarez (as Charles Honi Coles)
Neal Jones	...	Billy Kostecki
'Cousin Brucie' Morrow	...	Magician
Wayne Knight	...	Stan
Paula Trueman	...	Mrs. Schumacher
Alvin Myerovich	...	Mr. Schumacher

Storyline

In 1963, Frances "Baby" Houseman, a sweet daddy's girl, goes with her family to a resort in upstate New York's Catskill Mountains. Baby has grown up in privileged surroundings and all expect her to go on to college, join the Peace Corps and save the world before marrying a doctor, just like her father. Unexpectedly, Baby becomes infatuated with the camp's dance instructor, Johnny Castle, a man whose background is vastly different from her own. Baby lies to her father to get money to pay for an illegal abortion for Johnny's dance partner. She then fills in as Johnny's dance partner and it is as he is teaching her the dance routine that they fall in love. It all comes apart when Johnny's friend falls seriously ill after her abortion and Baby gets her father, who saves the girl's life. He then learns what Baby has been up to, who with and worse - that he funded the illegal abortion. He bans his daughter from any further association with "those people". In the first deliberately willful ...

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Plot Keywords:

dance | abortion | dance instructor | love | resort | 

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Taglines:

Dancing to the beat of their hearts.

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Genres:

Drama | Romance

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Certificate:

PG-13

Details

Official Sites:

Official site [us]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

21 August 1987 (USA)

Also Known As:

Baile Caliente

Filming Locations:

Appalachian region, Virginia, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$6,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

$162,378 (USA) (22 August 1997)

Gross:

$63,892,689 (USA) (12 September 1997)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Great American Films Limited Partnership, Vestron Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

100 min

Sound Mix:

DTS (re-release) Dolby Digital (re-release) Dolby (original release) SDDS (re-release)

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Emile Ardolino:  At the scene right before Johnny goes in to the kitchen to get Penny.

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Goofs

When Johnny has to bust the back window of his car, the shot inside the car shows that the entire window frame gives way, but from the outside shot, there is only a hole and the window frame is in place.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Radio disc jockey: [on radio] Hi, everybody, this is your Cousin Brucie. Whoa! Our summer romances are in full bloom, and everybody, but everybody's in love. So cousins, here's a great song from The Four Seasons.
Baby: [voiceover] That was the summer of 1963 - when everybody called me Baby, and it didn't occur to me to mind. That was before President Kennedy was shot, before the Beatles came, when I couldn't wait to join the Peace Corps, and I thought I'd never find a guy as great as my dad. That was the ...

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Connections

Referenced in Glow Ropes: The Rise and Fall of a Bar Mitzvah Emcee (2008)

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Soundtracks

"Cry to Me"
Performed by Solomon Burke
Courtesy of Atlantic Recording Corp.
by arrangement with Warner Special Products

User Reviews

Repeated viewings reveal a well crafted story

When this film was released I dismissed as being lightweight pop nonsense. That was a mistake.

After repeated viewings and seeing a documentary of the making of DIRTY DANCING, discovering the depth of this film certainly increases its appeal.

DIRTY DANCING is a film about change. The evolving nature of relationships within the family, the changes in one's view of the world during their coming of age, etc. The story takes place during August of 1963, the final weeks of the last summer of innocence for the American people. The many personal changes experienced by the characters reflect the many changes in American society that would be marked by the Kennedy assassinations and Vietnam.

Female movie go'ers adored this film and repeated trips to the movie houses made it the world's most successful dance movie. As a male I find the romantic pairing of ultimate stud Patrick Swayze with very plain Jennifer Grey very hard to accept. This would be fatal for most romantic dramas, and it also may have create the intense dislike expressed by most male reviewers.

The film's soundtrack found #1 status before the release of the movie. To this day it is nearly impossible to attend a wedding reception without hearing a DIRTY DANCING song.

Near the midpoint of the film Baby's mother wakes up and asks Baby's father, "Is anything wrong?"

Baby's father, the anti-change family member, attempts to keep all that is happening a secret. He tells his wife to go back to sleep. However, resist as one can, change is unstopable. DIRTY DANCING is the story of one person waking up just at the final moments of our country's last sleep in innocence.