'Grease'

Grease -- maybe unlike any other piece of gobbledygook in history -- is the most polarizing piece of art in history.

People don't like Grease. They either love it or absolutely hate it. There's no in between and the line can typically be drawn down gender lines. Chicks dig it, dudes don't.

Until right now, I had not seen Grease in its entirety. There are some scenes and songs that I'd never, ever seen. I think I see some very simple issues with the film that turn guys off.

Time
The film begins at the beginning of the school year. Sandy is the new girl, an Australian import, and she is befriended by the Pink Ladies, who are associated by reputation and attitude to the T-Birds. Their leader is Danny Zuko, Sandy's love interest over the summer. All of the Pink Ladies and T-Birds are seniors. Over the next 100 minutes things happen. None of what happens is school. There is a night at the drive-in. The dance. Danny trying out sports. A date night. The T-Birds in the big drag race. At the end of the movie, the school year is over. It's the end-of-the-year carnival and the gang's all together.

Problem is, guys need some semblance of time. Guys need Thanksgiving, Halloween, Christmas break, New Years Day, Valentines and Spring Break. Basically, Grease fits seven months of school into 100 minutes. There is no autumn, winter or spring. The summer heat never dissipated. A get an acceleration of time, but what happens on all the other days? Surely there are other adventures taking place. There is school. There are romances. There are break-ups and hook-ups. There is a lot more we're missing than what we're getting ...

Songs
... because all we do is listen to songs. Good God Almighty! There are a ton of songs in this movie. I thought it was a handful. It feels there are a ton more songs in Grease than there are in other musicals. On top of that, most songs have no relevance. Summer Lovin' is the best in terms of being an actual song and serving as a plot device: We learn what Sandy and Danny did over the summer, how they feel about each other and their perceptions versus how they want to look in front of their friends. "Hopelessly Devoted To You" is also important. We learn how Sandy feels. Otherwise, the other songs are fodder. They focus on unimportant characters or conflicts that never come to a head.

Conflict
Speaking of, there is no conflict. I get that this film is fun and that its a musical, but all musicals have conflict. Some heavier than others, but there's conflict. Grease fails in this department. It did try. Frenchie quitting high school to then fail at beauty school was a huge issue. However, they failed to develop the conflict and the character herself. Instead, they opted for a campy guest star by Frankie Avalon. The second conflict was Rizzo's near-pregnancy. It turned out to be a false alarm, but why? Being pregnant in high school out of wedlock is no laughing, easy matter. However, the film was not made in 1959; it's just set in 1959. It was a perfect opportunity to take the crystal vase and smash it into the wall. The director and writers decided to not rock the boat.

The Actuality Of Badness
At their worst, the protagonists in the film are good kids. The T-Birds are not violent. None of them do drugs. Most just like to have sex. That doesn't make you bad, edgy or antiestablishment. It makes you dumb. There is no fights, death or some overriding despair. The students of Rydell High School are spoiled suburbanites, many of whom will go to college or enter a career. They will not be strung out on heroin on Skid Row. They will not be prostitutes or in jail. Instead, they'll be normal. I'm not saying The Westside Story is a benchmark for male film enjoyment, but it was edgy, I don't care how those boys dance. The Sharks and Jets are racists. They want to kill each other and run each other out of the neighborhood. They wind up actually killing each other. None of those kids have much of a future. They do drugs and fight. The T-Birds would have been killed by the Sharks.