Such a frustrating disappointment

Just what I expected

Absolutely Brilliant!

A Major Disappointment

I almost gave it 5 out of 10. However, I don't want to be hard on Flashdance. It's not a perfect movie by any means, I can't even say that it's a good movie. However, at its core, it has heart, soul, and passion. It also has the drive to send its message clear, stay close to your dreams, but try to make it a reality. Do what you love to do, and you will never have to work a day in your life. I felt the movie depended way too strongly on the dancing and the music, which left what remained of the film hollow and weak. And Jennifer Beals just wasn't a strong enough actress to pull this off. Can't overlook it. Sorry. All in all, I think Flashdance served its purpose for its time, it made a lot of money, and love it or hate it, but you can't knock it...it's an iconic film of 1983.

Style-over-substance films usually annoy me. When those movie are as bad as Flashdance, I just want to ask the people who made them what they were thinking. Actually, this was produced by Jerry Bruckheimer and Don Simpson, who are well known for making films of cinematic gloss, but nothing with real humanity. The story is so simple, the whole thing is probably 50 minutes too long. This is basically Rocky if the story has dance scenes for filler, the numerous subplots went nowhere, and the characters weren't appealing.For a story, Jennifer Beals plays a young girl named Alex who wants to be a professional dancer, and not just to dance at a small nightclub. By day, she works as a welder at a steel mill; shocking since she is only 18. The steel mill boss's son falls in love with her and later tries to help her get into the professional dance group that she yearns to be a part of, if only she had more confidence.Everything that I highlighted in just three sentences is everything there is to know about the main story. Everything else is just music video-inspired dancing scenes (which, unfortunately, are mostly performed by Beals's body double instead of Beals herself) set to popular 80s songs, and subplots that go nowhere or are resolved in five minutes. For one thing, Alex sees the boss's son with his previous wife, she gets mad and throws a rock at his window, but the next day, he explains why his ex-wife was with him in the first place. Later, her friend joins a sleazy strip club, and Alex forces her to leave after three minutes. There is even an old woman who is Alex's friend, and conveniently, was also a famous dancer. Not enough time is spent on the relationship they have and the film never establishes how they met.The acting is average at best, with Beals giving the warmest performance of the whole cast, and most of the characters act like old stereotypes, such as the pathetic friend who makes useless jokes (which leads to another sub-plot that goes nowhere) and the aggressive jocks who have eyes for the main heroine. Alex herself is also the victim of the horrible screenplay. Close to the beginning of the film, she actually does come close to signing up for an audition for the dance group, but she backs out because she is afraid. Not a good enough reason? Well, the film still has an hour and fifteen minutes left, and if she did get her confidence at that moment, it would be nothing more than a short film.I have very little to say about Flashdance because the film offers so little. I guess the dance scenes are well shot, and Beals performance makes things a little more tolerable, but everything else is quite awful. Even some of the 80s songs are poor. This is easily one of the most uninteresting pieces of nothing ever made.

Love musicals. Love dramas. Love a lot of films from the 80s, despite being aware of some of my friends who consider it one of the weaker decades for film. While there are certainly far worse musicals, there are also far better. 'Flashdance' is not without its moments but overall left me not completely feeling it.Where 'Flashdance' is most successful is in the soundtrack and dancing. The soundtrack is toe-tappingly infectious and is infused with a lot of energy. This is particularly so with "What a Feeling", wonderfully sung by Irene Cara, which won a worthy Oscar and became an iconic hit of the 80s. "Maniac" is a close second. The dance sequences are clearly strenuous, while also being high-octane in energy and having surprising grace.That is not to say that it doesn't have other good things elsewhere. Adrian Lynne directs very well, capturing perfectly the post-disco visual mood and general atmosphere of the time. 'Flashdance' looks good too, being cleverly shot and atmospherically lit and designed.However, the acting is really not great. Jennifer Beals seemed too lightweight for a pretty lewd character, and when showing a more aggressive, harder side it comes over as annoying and like she was uncomfortable doing it. She does fare better than Michael Nouri, whose character is obnoxious, bland and clichéd, all of those accentuated in Nouri's acting. If the rest of the cast are not being mentioned, it is because their contributions were not memorable.'Flashdance's' script is a complete mess. Cliché-ridden, cheesy and often tasteless. The story is vastly overshadowed by the film's style, music and dancing, it is barely existent and what there is pretty dull and preposterous, too often the opposite of feel-good or charming while the sordid-ness also feels over the top. Nice message, if not exactly new, but the very frothy and severely underdeveloped romance belongs somewhere else entirely.Overall, has good points but am not completely feeling it. 5/10 Bethany Cox

I really liked the first half hour of this film because of Lyne's fantastic direction and the great editing and sound. However, after that, the lack of story began to take its toll and I found the film dragged. I also felt the story was quite confused, with characters and sub plots popping up without rhyme or reason and being left with loose ends.I didn't like Jennifer Beals's acting and I found the portrayal of her character too aggressive. You can imagine her becoming a diva if she ever hit the big time. She wasn't given much back story so I never felt I know who she was, why she was working as a welder or why she wanted to get where she was going.The last 5 minutes, with the dance audition, became horrendously cheesy and quite out of tone with this otherwise mature film.