WATCHING XANADU: SOME NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS

Yeah, that's right, Xanadu.  I had never seen it before.

In no particular order or priority:

* It is always interesting to watch a film whose reputation precedes itself by some thirty or forty years, even if its reputation isn't a good one.  So Plan 9 from Outer Space was fun, as was Apocalypse Now, as was The Godfather.  Xanadu was no exception.

* Speaking of watching a movie a long, long time after it was released, I feel like I got something of a unique perspective on the film's nostalgia toward the 1940s.  That is, the whole Gene Kelly story arc is sort of obsessed with the big band era, and 1945 is even mentioned as the time when he had his moment with Kira.  Because Xanadu was shot in 1980, we're talking about the film's narrative looking back thirty five years.  Two years from now it will have been thirty five years since 1980.  So there was a kind of double dose of nostalgia for me, given the time frame in which I saw the movie, nostalgia for the 40s, seen through a late 70s lens, and nostalgia for the late 70s, as presented by the movie itself, and through the lens of my own memory of the period, when I was only twelve.  And you know what?  It works pretty well on that level.

* The soundtrack, with ELO, Cliff Richard, and, of course Olivia Newton John, continues to be as great as it was back in 1980.  This is definitely one of the movie's strengths.

* I watched it with my girlfriend, who has loved the movie since she was ten.  So to a great extent, I got to see it through her eyes.  And that makes me realize that, in spite of the multiple conceptual train wrecks comprising the plot, Xanadu is, in its most basic form, a fairy tale, a children's story, and should be judged in those terms.  Indeed, it succeeds quite well as a children's story, a sort of Wizard of Oz for kids who were on the cusp of coming of age in the free-wheeling late 70s.

Really, Xanadu becomes more interesting the more I think about it.

* One of the best aspects of Xanadu, and it's almost needless to say, is Gene Kelly.  For years, I had simply assumed that there was just no way he could have been a good fit for the project.  And it does get a bit weird here and there.  I mean, he's just so totally Gene Kelly, older, to be sure, but the same guy from Singing in the Rain and On the Town.  He just does his thing and assumes it will all work out.  Amazingly, it does all work out.  He's Gene Kelly, no matter what.

* Speaking of the acting, it's not Olivia Newton John's best work, and what's-his-name is pretty bland himself.  But something that does shine through, something that makes their work valuable, and this is going on with pretty much all the onscreen talent, is total sincerity about what they're doing.  As silly and goofy as Xanadu is, all these performers give it their all.  They believe in what they're doing.  And if you let yourself join them, you can kinda, just sorta, almost, believe, too.

Really, Olivia Newton John makes up in sincerity what she lacks in dancing ability.

* Wait a minute, that was the Tubes up there?  I was wondering how they got it so right.

* So...the muses are apparently love 'em and leave 'em sexual predators who make mortal artists, musicians, and poets fall in love with them which provides artistic inspiration.  Then, satisfied, these immortal beauties hit the road like the cheap disco hussies they are.  Kind of sick and twisted.  I like it.

This, then, makes part of the movie about Kira rejecting the rules by which she has played for centuries in order to embrace true love.  I like that, too.

* I totally love the disco/science fiction Buck Rogers aesthetic, which really starts to take off by the time what's-his-name goes to Olympus to see Kira, but goes into the stratosphere for the closing massive song and dance number at Xanadu.

* Xanadu is totally stupid and absurd, but also completely charming.

* Probably not at all supported by the text, but in my mind this is what happened: Kira has felt very guilty for thirty five years about how she treated Gene Kelly back in 1945, so she has arranged a sort of Prospero-play, as with The Tempest, to make things right and put herself into a position such that she can fall in love, herself.  So the whole thing is all her Machiavellian machination.  She brings Gene Kelly back to music.  She inspires her last artist.  And she comes down to Earth.  So she can love.



$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$