Dance Or Die
(1987)
Director: Richard Munchkin
Cast: Roy Kieffer, Rebecca Barrington, Georgia Neu
Dance Or Die was one of the first efforts
by PM Entertainment, back when producers Richard Pepin and Joseph Merhi
called their company City Lights. Watching it, one can see that since
making
this movie, they have made great leaps in every aspect of filmmaking
that
you can think of. In fact, it's so radical a leap, you have to wonder
how
they ever got beyond this point. Even though it was easier to sell an
independent
movie to video stores in the '80s, Dance Or Die and
their
other movies of this period are so bad, you'd think they'd had quickly
made a (bad) name for themselves. Maybe they did, which would explain
the
change in the name of their company. Even the awful movie Chance,
which they made just two years later, had nothing on this numbingly bad
effort.
I have questioned to myself with other early Pepin/Merhi
movie if they were actually shot on film, for they seemed suspiciously
like they were originally shot on video but placed through that process
that makes video look like film. With Dance Or Die,
there
is absolutely no doubt. I don't know what they call that process, but
it's
the worst example of its kind I can ever recall seeing. It looks like
gauze
or something was placed over the video camera lens, and despite the
process,
the intensity of the lights and the speed of things racing past the
screen
all scream that they were videotaped and not filmed. So right away, we
are faced with cheapness. Actually, I got an idea that this was going
to
be a cheap film even before I put the video into my VCR. On the video
cassette,
the label states that the movie is called Dance Or Di -
apparently,
they couldn't afford an extra "e".
The movie takes place in Las Vegas, but with almost all
the movie taking place in indoor locations or outside in the suburbs,
the
movie only shows us unmistakable Las Vegas locations a few times in the
entire film, and only as background scenery. The events that happen in
the movie could have taken place anywhere, with absolutely no change to
the script needed. They center around this dimwitted loser named Jason
Chandler, a guy who is a recovering drug addict and regularly attends
Narcotics
Anonymous meetings around the city. He's a very poorly written
character;
what happened in his past, how he got addicted, hell, even what drug he
was addicted to is never revealed to us. All that we do find out about
him is that he's some kind of dance director, who is struggling to keep
his addiction down while directing some new wave dance presentation. We
only see some minor uncostumed rehearsals occasionally, though
eventually
we get to see it presented at the end. It's hard to describe it in just
a few words - hell, even just in words - but I'll try. The
dancers
(in big '80s hairdos and wearing gigantic sunglasses) shake their
shoulders
around, shuffle side to side, and stretch out their arms and legs and
pause
repeatedly. Oh, as the dance progresses, squibs in their chests
bloodily
explode one by one to make it look like they were shot, and they keep
dancing
with these bloody "wounds".
I guess it comes as no surprise that only about 10
people
are seen attending the show at the end. Some people might think it's
because
of the budget constraints, but I think it's to show that Jason isn't
financially
secure, and has to have a roommate sharing his big house with a pool at
the back. Though this roommate also adds to Jason's stress, because he
happens to be a drug dealer, casually weighing the coke in their
kitchen
but being conscious enough to slap Jason's hand away from the drugs,
knowing
that Jason is a former addict - friends keep friends away from drugs,
you
know. At least Jason doesn't have much time to get all stressed up
about
his roommate; shortly afterwards, while Jason is away to rehearse his
presentation
with his dancers, armed thugs break into the backyard while the
roommate
and his friends are having a barbecue. In one of the worst edited
sequences
I can recall, the action cuts back and forth again and again and again
from the slaughter at the barbecue (where guests later in the carnage
are
kind enough to pretend to the killers that no slaughter is happening
around
them, for they are still standing nonchalantly around) to Jason and his
aerobic-dressed dancers making asses out of themselves, with a routine
that's a cross between ballet and aerobics. And all of this slaughter
and
dance is set to a peppy synthesizer score, even when the innocents at
the
barbecue are blasted with the biggest and bloodiest shotgun wounds you
can imagine.
Of course, the removal of this roommate this way just
adds to Jason's stress, and the investigating detective, the standard
slightly
overweight asshole cop that insanely accuses the hero adds even more.
Jason
has a nightmare that night where he is hanging upside down in a
strait-jacket,
and as we hear "Ho ho ho ho ho ho ho etc." in the background, big
white-haired
'80s rockers in S&M leather prance around him, make wild poses, and
beat him with sticks in an overly theatrical manner. Heavy symbolism -
though what it symbolizes, I don't have a hell of a clue. The next day,
Jason is beaten up by some guy when he's alone at the dance studio, and
is told, "You have something we want!" Then the guy leaves. He later
gets
phone calls that are equally as vague and quick, never giving Jason or
us just who these guys are, or what they want. Well, anyone who has
seen
a movie would put two and two together and determine Jason's roommate
was
hiding something. I guess Jason doesn't get out that much. Also, I
guess
these bad guys aren't in that much of a rush to get what they want if
they
don't specifically tell Jason what they seek.
There's not a real rush of anything in Dance Or
Die. It's not just these vague threats that prevent the movie
from
advancing in its story. There are a number of filler bits that just
seem
to be there in order to stretch the movie to a 90 minute running time.
I can't count how many shots there are of Jason driving around various
parts of Las Vegas, sometimes not even heading anywhere important. This
is also the kind of movie where they will show us a guy pulling off the
highway, driving into a parking lot, finding a parking space, pulling
into
the parking space, stopping the car, then getting out and walking to a
building. Another scene has Jason finding out that a code name involved
in his slow investigation is "Turtle". Looking into his refrigerator,
he
finds a box of Turtles chocolates from his roommate, and he proceeds in
the lengthy task of completely destroying the box in order to possibly
find something, ripping apart the cardboard and the liner inside,
dumping
the chocolates on the ground etc. etc. It turns out there was nothing
hidden
in the box after all, making it a complete waste of time for both Jason
and the viewing audience. Even the scenes where something does happen
are
stretched out. A motorcycle riding friend of Jason is chased around the
desert suburbs in an exceedingly long and unexciting chase. He
eventually
manages to wipe out his pursuers, then as he prepares to leave, a
second
car of bad guys suddenly pulls up and kills him. When it takes so long
to kill a "he's gonna die!" character, you know you are in trouble.
To call the script thin would be a kindness. I might
have
given director Richard Munchkin some slack for working with such a
script,
but it turns out that he wrote it. The movie is incredible in that
there
are so many scenes that abruptly end, with either no proper explanation
or that Munchkin edited out for the final cut. For example, one phone
call
has the caller telling Jason that he left him something in his pool.
The
scene quickly ends, and we never find out what was in the pool. We see
shots throughout the movie of a professional audio recorder that is
monitoring
Jason's phone calls, but we never find out who owns it. So little time
is spent with some key characters, that their eventual actions
sometimes
could mean one thing or another. Near the end of the movie, Jason
whines,
"I don't know who are the good guys anymore!" I shared his complaint.
Munchkin shows absolutely no visual flair, and uses the
distracting fade-to-black transition so much, the movie soon plays like
it was originally made to have commercial breaks. Aside from the dance
sequences, and a fantasy sequence when Jason imagines two imaginary
people
dry-humping each other in various positions and poses on a motorcycle
(while
he's engaged in sex with a beautiful blonde!), Munchkin doesn't even
make
the movie so bad it's funny. All the actors are left to their own
devices,
and Roy Kieffer is simply awful, coming across as a whiny little boy
instead
of someone feeling trapped between a rock and a hard place. There is,
however,
one performance of note; it is that of the character of Kay, who is
Jason's
counselor at the Narcotics Anonymous meetings. She is good enough to
actually
manage to generate some chemistry with the awful acting Kieffer, not
just
when it comes to arguing about how to stay sober, but when she admits
that
despite being significantly older, she is attracted to him. She is
convincing
in whatever she is given in the script to read, though fortunately for
her Munchkin's script shows some competency here with her character.
She
believes in God and that He can intervene in mysterious ways, tells
interesting
stories to Jason about this to show he may be getting help for his
addiction
that he doesn't realize, and has a good speech as to why that, although
she is attracted to Jason, she can't sleep with him. In all of her
scenes,
the actress who plays Kay does very well. If I could, I would tell you
the name of this actress and mention that she is the one good thing
about Dance
Or Die. Unfortunately, the end credits just listed the actors,
and not the parts they played, so she'll have to stay anonymous. If the
woman who played this role is reading this, sorry.
Check
for availability on Amazon (VHS)
See also: Chance, Timebomb, Video Violence
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