Hi everyone and welcome to another weekly post. This week, we’ve finished our scripts and are going to have our episodes out next week! For this week’s post, I decided to talk about the movie Grease. This movie came out in the late 70’s, but actually very well depicts what it was like for youth in the 50s: young love, drive-in movies, different styles (ie. greasers), dances, rock n roll, diners, etc.

The movie is a fun, feel-good movie with a few catchy songs but, if you were to
listen to it at this day and age, you might notice a couple things that would not be shown on tv today. 

Number one, some of the lines in the songs were quite inappropriate (such as the lyric “Did she put up a fight?” in Summer Nights). In my opinion, the likely meaning of this line would be if he tried to kiss her because we all know that
sex before marriage was extremely rare in the 50s. Another one relating to that point would be Rizzo being shamed for having sex, because of how rare it was. 

Number two, at the dance, the host said that partners had to be one girl and one boy. A lot of people have been hating on this line saying that it was homophobic. That doesn’t mean that that made that line okay, but you need to keep in mind of the context and when this movie was based in, the 50s, which was a completely different time. 

Number three, which was that there was absolutely no diversity in the entire movie. I decided to do a little research on segregation in schools which was a big thing in the 50s. But, later found out that it was actually forbidden in Pennsylvania (where the movie was based in), so there was no reason for them not to have any diversity in the film except for the fact that even in the 70s when this was filmed, that there was an obvious lack of diversity in media. 

Number four, the same people hating on the movie did not like the fact that at the end of the movie, Sandy drastically changed her personality and look for Danny. But, I personally think that she just reinvented herself, as a lot of teenagers even in this day do. And doing it for themselves, not to impress someone they like. She also sings the song “Goodbye Sandra Dee”, because she didn’t want to be a “goodie two shoes” who didn’t have as much fun, anymore. 

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The first time I watched this movie was with my mom. She hadn’t seen it since she was in her teen years, so rewatching it as an adult caused her to noticed a few things that wouldn’t be as acceptable today, like the ones I had previously mentioned. She had then explained them to me and said to keep in mind that that was how it was in the 50s. 

In my opinion, I think that the purpose of the movie was made to be entertaining, fun and not to be taken so seriously. Most of those unacceptable parts of the film were there just for the purpose of showing what it was like in the 50s and how much society has changed in the last 20 years at the time (since it was made in the 70s about the 50s). The only part that I think the movie makers could’ve done better was have more diversity. On the other hand, if that were the case, would there have been racist comments made throughout the movie? And would that have affected how successful the movie became?