My wife and I were watching television last night, Monday night programming has two of our favorite programs back to back; “House, M.D.” and “Lie to Me.” The former is about ficticious Dr. Gregory House, a brilliant doctor-savant and his medical staff and the ‘unsolvable’ medical cases that come their way, and the latter is about a private agency for hire that, using the science of reading micro-expressions, body language and through the use of the Facial Action Coding System (see "FACS") can determine if people are telling lies. Every week, they are confronted with situations (usually from local or federal authorities in legal cases) where knowing the truthfulness of a person’s testimony can change the outcome of people’s lives.
Anyway, I suddenly realized that one of the stars this second season, Jennifer Beals, is the same actress from the movie “Flashdance.” In this, a 1983 musical/romance movie, a Pittsburgh, Pa. woman (Alexandra “Alex” Owens, played by Ms. Beals) is a welder by day and aspiring dancer by night trying to win a scholarship to a prestigenous and exclusive dance conservatory.
Her signature gray sweatshirt with the large neckhole that drapes teasingly over one shoulder in promotional posters was actually an accident in its creation, according to the actress. She is quoted as saying that she washed the sweatshirt and it shrunk. She cut the neck collar off so that she could get her head to fit and that made the hole too large. That ‘look’ is said to be one of the most memorable and successful visuals of the poster campaign for the movie.
This movie on its release received many unfavorable professional reviews from top film critics. Roger Ebert, a professional film critic and television film-review co-host, placed this movie on his personal list of “Most Hated” films and stated “Jennifer Beals shouldn’t feel bad. She is a natural talent, she is fresh and engaging here, and only needs to find an agent with a natural talent for turning down scripts.” (Ohhhh you’re so clever with that rapier-like wit of yours, Mr. Ebert!)
Still, the movie was a smashing success with the box office ratings grossing over $100 million dollars in worldwide sales and the music from the film won several awards. Careers were launched. I don’t much care for film critics’ views myself. I recall most film critics telling publically how bad that new George Lucas movie “Star Wars” was when it first aired in May, 1977 and well -big egg on their faces that time too!
Flashdance, the Movie
Most of the dancing scenes were not performed by Jennifer Beals at all, but by a troika of talented athletes in her stead. French actress and dancer Marine Jahan, a male dancer named Crazy Legs and the signature finale shot of Alex leaping through a hoop was performed by Sharon Shapiro, a professional gymnast. Still, my barely post-teenage hot jumping hormones told me that it was Jennifer Beals; and seeing the video again sure brings back that old flaming crush I had on her back then.
