XANADU: Was It Great or Were You 8?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ส.ค. 2022
- It's time for another round of "Was It Great or Were You 8?" where we look back at our childhood favorites to see whether they truly were great or we're just wallowing in nostalgia. It's Christy's turn, and in honor of her 50th birthday, she picked a movie she loved when she was 8: the notorious 1980 flop "Xanadu." Starring Olivia Newton-John, Michael Beck and Gene Kelly in this final film role. Directed by Robert Greenwald. Alonso will pick next time, so stay tuned!
#Xanadu #OliviaNewtonJohn #GeneKelly
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The best birthday present of all would be subscribing to us here at Breakfast All Day! If you haven't already hit that button, we'd love it if you joined us as we grow the channel with reviews, movie news and fun segments like this. Alonso will pick next on "Was It Great or Were You 8?" so don't miss it! 🎂🥳
I never saw the movie but I grew up listen to a lot of ELO, they’re my mom’s favorite band. I throughly enjoy the music and maybe after watching this maybe I should give it a chance.
And if it’s bad it has nothing on The Apple, one of the most insane things ever put to film.
Let us know!
"Magic" is surely one of the greatest pop songs ever.
Always a favorite.
Magic is the greatest pop song ever!
Netflix finally had Xanadu at the top of my dvd queue for the weekend. I remember loving it more back in the day but the music is still fun.
There's a dvd extra including Gene Kelly's widow etc. saying he wasn't going to dance at all in the movie but apparently was won over. And apparently the script went through many rewrites. And this was the best?!?
And 40 yrs later I still love the Tubes number.
Can't imagine him not dancing here. His scenes with ONJ are so charming.
Happy birthday, Christy! 🎂🎈🎁
The music is great, the movie is not - but the kitsch factor is high, so I'll rewatch it every now and then.
Always a good time.
I loved Xanadu when I was 10 and I still love it now!
That's great! Thanks for watching our video.
i was born in 1978, but i have two older sisters and we had it recorded off of tv on beta. we watched it and/or grease (what seemed like) daily. i still enjoy it, much to my wife’s chagrin.
So fun!
Happy birthday, Christy!🎂🎈🎉
Thank you!!
“Xanadu gives me pleasure.” - Alonso Duralde 2022
It's true.
Happy Birthday!!!!
Thank you!
I love Xanadu, I don’t remember how I discovered Xanadu but I’m pretty sure it would have been on TV sometime after Olivia’s “Physical” album had been released as I remember “Physical” being my first favorite album. I was 4 at the time Xanadu had its initial theatrical run so I know I didn’t see it then. Always loved the movie, had no clue who the “old guy” was at the time. The “Dancin” scene was my favorite part of the movie seeing those eras merge. I pretty much skipped the ELO side of the soundtrack up until seeing the musical version of Xanadu. I got a whole new level of appreciation for the entire film soundtrack thanks to the musical. You could have hit me upside the head, when I saw “Magic” on stage playing up the lyrics. It’s use in the film is “background pop music” so I never made the connection between its lyrics and the plot of the film. The stage show taught me to love the ELO songs and now the whole soundtrack album still comfortably sits in the top 25 most played songs in my iTunes collection. Plus being older and having seen more of Gene Kelly’s work, I appreciate him in the film so much more than I did when I was a kid. I like to jokingly refer to the pre-Olivia’s arrival in the finale as a pagan summoning ritual with the marching and chanting. It’s a grand finale and I love it. A friend of mine arranged for Olivia to sign the cover of the Laserdisc version of the film for me, so that is something I will always treasure.
Exactly re: Gene Kelly! Glad you enjoyed, thanks Ryan.
The way the two of you feel about this movie is very much how I feel about another musical choreographed by Kenny Ortega from my own childhood, and that movie is "Newsies." I recently realized that I was probably one of the few people of my generation to have watched that movie in the theater during the couple of weeks it played in theaters.
I decided to rewatch the movie for the first time since I was a child a few years ago. While I can now see the many flaws that led to this movie's poor critical reception, I find it so irrepressibly enjoyable that I'm willing to overlook those flaws.
Young Christian Bale!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CHRISTY!! You don't look a day over seventeen!!
Ha, thanks!
Great soundtrack
Wow Happy Birthday Christy! You seriously look effing incredible.
Woo hoo, thanks Katie!
Great ending, guys!
Thanks for sticking around the whole time!
I was 9 on August 8th 1980, about to turn 10 that September 23rd. I never saw Xanadu, but 1980 was an awesome year in my life nonetheless!! I love the "was it great or were you 8" concept 🤘😄😂
Thanks so much! We'll be sure to do more.
The songs were great.I loved every single song in this movie and I love the animated sequence that accompanied the song "Don't Walk Away" by ELO. I saw the movie at the now defunct Plitt movie theater in Century City,CA. on opening weekend in 1980. It was in eight-track stereo sound with Dolby noise reduction and it sounded great. I immediately bought the soundtrack the next day as well as my friend who saw the movie with it. I didn't like the film overall and I thought the acting was cheesy as well as some of the production numbers but it was so nice to see Gene Kelly back on the big screen again singing and dancing. I only wish that he could have ended his career on a higher note(no pun intended).
The songs were and are great! Thanks for watching and sharing your memories.
Happy Birthday, Christy!
And thank you for sharing your love of Xanadu with us!
Ha, thanks so much!
Happy belated birthday Christy! Guess someone will see u at Denny’s. :-).
Ha, didn't make it there.
I was 17 and a huge fan of ONJ when this came out and when I saw it in the theatre I thought it was bad, but it was Olivia, Michael Beck (hot) and to my surprise featured one of my favorite Bay Area bands The Tubes doing "Dancin'" with her. Years later its still bad by I have an appreciation for it...and the soundtrack is still amazing
Exactly: Bad, but you appreciate it.
I saw Xanadu on Broadway when I was 12, which was my one and only Broadway experience. I barely remember the story but I remember having a great time! Now I need to watch the movie
That is a great one to have! Did you see Cheyenne Jackson?
Happy birthday christie!! 💕💕
Thanks so much!
Happy Birthday, Christy!
Thank you!!
Happy Birthday Christy!
Thanks! It's been a while.
Happy birthday Christy!!!
Thanks Bruno!
Happy Birthday Christy!! 🎊
I feel when was 8 I worshiped early 2000s Milla Jovovich action movies and Charlie's Angels movies. Now when I stumble upon some scenes from Resident Evil on the internet I cringe at myself, the effects have not aged well.
No they have not.
Happy Birthday, Christy. Like Xanadu, 50 is a magic year. You're not in your 50s until you hit 51 😉
Yes! Thank you!
I watched this not long after Olivia died and I was really charmed by it. Like it helped that so much of this movie is a performance where you have such great songs and dance sequences all throughout and lots of the underrated songs are also great very much like Suddenly.
The only major weakness imo is Michael Beck who is just a piece of cardboard there, he's kind of holding down the whole movie from being totally camp or totally romantic. Though I heard he was not the movie's first choice, they originally wanted David Naughton but couldn't get him.
Totally, but ONJ and Gene Kelly are so charming, they make up for it.
Xanadu, Fame & Times Square were the movies that came out in 1980 that impacted me for life. I have nothing but love for them.
A total time capsule.
I absolutely love that you guys are doing this! As we get older we are constantly straining to recall our initial thoughts on a film or tv show, often comparing & examining the way we look at it now and then (age 9).
Thanks for watching, Langley!
I like the concept of guilty pleasure for this one.
We feel no guilt!
Happy Birthday Christy!! Indeed still love it as I did back in 1980 as a 12 year old. Yes, it's pretty bad now but my deep affection for it hasn't changed. The music definitely saved it from being a real stinker. 80's maximalism for sure! Xanadu forever!!!
Exactly! Thanks, Mark.
Both. Every week when the TV guide came in the paper on Sunday they listed the movies that were going to be on that week, and my ass would dutifully tear right to the back page looking for (W)illy Wonka and (X)andadu.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTY!!!! ❤❤ Go roller skating on your special day!
Ha, it's been a while!
Happy Birthday!!
Thank you, Bill!
happy birthday christy!! hope it’s a great day for you!!
It has been, thanks!
Happy birthday Christy 🎂
Thanks so much!
Happy birthday!
Thank you!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MADAME!!! Are you sure you should be allowed on the internet unsupervised? Don’t you worry about being so close to the cut off age for TH-cam terms of service?! Id say you don’t look a day over 15 Christy!!! 😜🎉🎊🎈🎂🥳🎵
Ha, thanks so much!
🎂🎂🎂 *HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CHRISTY!* 🎂🎂🎂
_(sings "CHRIS-TY! .... FIF-TY!" to the tune of Kiss's utterly-gross-but-still-kinda-rockin' "Christine Sixteen")_
Woo hoo!
The early 80's aesthetic is so cozy. Honestly it feels like what being 8 felt like!
Totally.
Sally O'Malley is looking great! Stretch, kick, & stretch 🤣
The Rockettes are next on the birthday to-do list!
I'm of the opinion that the term "guilty pleasure" has it's place in our lexicon, and that it definitely applies to films like this. That said, I didn't see Xanadu til I was an adult, andI just didn't take to it. I'm gonna have to go with "you were 8". 🙂
Don't get me wrong - you're talking to a guy who has seen "Sextette" and "Can't Stop The Music" multiple times - ON PURPOSE - so I understand how and why you both can love a film like this. I just found myself more bored than entertained. I was pleasantly surprised to see The Tubes in it, though!
I saw the Broadway show in 2008 but didn't see the movie until 2019. Didn't hate the movie, but liked the musical more.
It's fun!
Happy birthday Christy! Xanadu is great. I will die on that hill! 😂 It's a delight
Indeed!
Your video title reminded me of The Black Stallion. Rewatched it 10 years ago wondering if it was great or I was just 6. Answer is it’s an art film children’s fantasy that’s one of the most beautiful movies I’ve ever seen. Truly remarkable and I’m still flummoxed that the final scene chokes me up
I just saw it like a month ago. The race in the end where there's no music, you just hear the horses is kind of amazing. Normally they would drown scenes like that in music so leaving it out was kind of amazing.
@@basquat76 yeah, that’s the scene where my eyes suddenly filled with tears and my throat chocked up - it’s so vulnerable, hopeful, and full of cathartic wonder - like a wise adult telling a battered child that against all odds reality can be even more beautiful and surreal than they had dreamt
@@theblondebomber It's worth watching the film just for those scenes. The race and the one where he's alone on the track. They don't cut the scene short either. It's just him and the horse going at full speed for a few minutes. It's amazing
The Black Stallion is stunning. It accomplishes so much wordlessly.
@@BreakfastAllDay yes, when I rewatched it as an adult and saw that for the first 30 minutes or so on the island there was no dialogue or monologue I thought- 1. This cinematography is gorgeous 2. How on earth did they get this film green lit? A children’s art flick? Amazing.
happy birthday christy
Thanks, Ali!
Now when I think of this movie knowing Michael Beck was in The Warriors about two years before, ya gotta think whatever dudes thought he was cool from that movie. Xanadu comes out, respect goes right out the window!
they really did a good retro review of an underrated bad movie from the early 80s
That's called range!
Happy birthday, Christy!! My "Was it great or was I 8?" film is Jesus Christ Superstar! I love it so much but when I look up reviews I realize I may be the only one! ☺️🥰🎂🥳🎈🎁
Not at all! And thanks.
Christy, you looked like you had a good time with this review. Alonzo chimed in with a nice observation. Not great but fun. I used to watch just for the ELO sings.
We did, thanks!
Happy 25th Birthday Christy 🌮🎉
I'm gonna put Xanadu on my to watch list, not totally convinced about it but I'll watch it in your honor lol
Excellent! Let us know what you think.
I liked Star Wars when I was 8... not so much as a middle aged adult.
Star Wars is still fun, right?
@@BreakfastAllDay Mehhh... it is fine. I don't get the religious cult-like love for it.
I LOVED Xanadu! I haven’t seen it in years but I danced and sang to the soundtrack. I felt the same way about Popeyes. So awful but as a really little kid I thought it was so fun.
SO fun. Thanks Shiloh!
Happy 50th, Christy! It's your birthday, featuring the Grandmaster! th-cam.com/video/8zgz2xBrvVQ/w-d-xo.html
Ha, thanks!
Roller skating was simply box office poison in 1980 (Xanadu/Heaven's Gate)
But it's so fun!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTY!!!!
I think what makes "Xanadu" so great is the amazing soundtrack, and of course Oliva Newton- John
she was "Magic"
I also believe you can place some of the crazy things that does happen on the fact that she was a muse.
As an example, they being in a Don Bluth cartoon from out of nowhere.
Ha, good point, and thanks!
Xanadu = peak Olivia
Happy Birthday Christy! PS: I saw Xanadu when it came out in the theaters. For some reason I expected it to be a cross between Grease and Saturday Night Fever, which it was not.
Ha, it is not!
I had an exgirlfriend who forced me to watch it. It's cute, Neon Roller skating NEVER stops being cool, plus Gene Kelly performance adds more to it.
Ha, he sure does.
The music was great
So many good songs.
I was 18 and yes I both loved it and hated it... awesome and awful is exactly right! Being Australian, I loved ONJ all through the 70s in my teens 'cause yes she's adorable and yes she can sing but mostly I loved her songs!! However she can only kinda dance and roller-skate a bit, kinda badly, but sorry she sure can't act if her life depended on it!!!!! ELO's music is awesome!! Did you watch it again for your birthday Christy??? Hope you did something memorable!!
I did, thank you!
Haha, I love the title.
Thank you! That's an Alonso phrase.
Well the Roller Disco Palace thing may have been going out but Gene Kelly's Idea may have predicted the Swing/Big Band resurgence only
eighteen/nineteen years to early, lol!
Roller skating came back recently, though!
It's interesting to me that more people talk about XANADU than they do ORDINARY PEOPLE. XANADU is phenomenal when there is singing and dancing but my word is it painful when there's dialogue. I just fast forward the talking bits now. I also wonder how much late 70's/early 80's drug use was responsible for the erratic nature of the film.
Ha, an excellent theory!
Wasn't Sonny Malone the name of the lounge singer on It's/Making A Living?
Oh wow, totally forgot about that show! Just looked it up, it's Sonny Mann.
Haha it was definitely not great but the soundtrack was the first cassette tape I ever bought. I actually saw it several times. Soundtrack definitely holds up.
Ha, thanks for watching!
@@BreakfastAllDay Keep doing these they're great fun!
hey could you do a retro review of bad boys 1995 with will smith and Martin Lawrence I would like to know your thoughts on that movie
Maybe! Thanks for the suggestion.
I've never seen this one. Sounds like I should at least fast forward to the Gene Kelly parts.
Or ... watch the whole thing and be dazzled!
Because ELO is one of my favorite bands I have tried to watch this but have not gotten very far. The cheese factor was too great each time i tried. I will try again though because I believe in second, oops, I mean third chances!
Please try again because the finale is awesome.
@@BreakfastAllDay I will! I promise!! lol
In regard to the "was it great or were you 8?"
Did the film have to come out when you were eight? Or if you were eight, but saw Jurassic Park in 2002, would that also count?
That's a good question -- we're picking movies that came out the year we were 8 and that's when we saw them.
it was great and i was 28 :)
Awesome!
Wait... Is this something you've done before? What movie did you did before this one? Is it a patreon exclusive thing?
This is a thing we do here! It's our second one. Alonso went first and picked The Bad News Bears: th-cam.com/video/FFJzkNArOMI/w-d-xo.html
This and Grease 2 at great for Matt Lattanzi spotting
There's a blast from the past.
What is the problem with a guilty pleasure?
There is none!
I never saw the movie but I bought the soundtrack. ELO was my favorite band since I was 7 and ONJ was great in Grease. I listened to the soundtrack a lot back then but it isn’t that great of a ELO album. I don’t think I would like the movie now I was about 12 when the movie came out and I don’t think my preteen self might go for the goofy parts of the movie.
Give it a try!
Never a great movie, but in no way a pretentious one either. ELO and The Tubes, for decades, wouldn't play their songs from Xanadu. But now embrace them full. But really it's the soundtrack that sells the movie.
The movie came out in the summer of 1980, one of the greatest movie summers ever. The other movies that summer were "The Shining", "The Empire Strikes Back", "Airplane", "The Blues Brothers", "Fame", "Urban Cowboy", and "Caddyshack". Most of those movies had great and memorable soundtracks and music. That's something truly missed from modern movies.
Glad you loved it too! Thanks for watching.
There were SO MANY movies that I would say were so much worse. I absolutely hated Natural Born Killers, I wanted my money back when I saw it, and it was supposed to be acclaimed, another movie that comes to mind, Leonard Part 6, so awful it's not even funny. I could go on, but I loved this movie when I was growing up, I still love it to this day, it's a time capsule, has awesome music, it has Olivia Newton John, and Gene Kelley and it's a musical, and a love story. It's far far far from the worst movie, haters just gonna hate.
Ah a bygone era when someone sang you could clearly hear the lyrics, how dare they.
Ha, true.
Was too old then to be interested in this or any movie like this... then. The greatest decade in movie making had just finished and this would have been a pretty shitty mouth cleaner to that viewing experience.
If by shitty you mean awesome then yes.
@@BreakfastAllDay To be fair I don't remember watching most of it on some late night television. Maybe you need to flip the question on its head and ask, were we too young but not young enough to appreciate a given film. I was 25 then.
I was 20 and in love with ONJ. The movie sucked music above average. ELO/ONJ is eternal. Gene Kelly kicks ass at 67.
All good stuff!
Finally saw it on Max a few years ago. Is it perfect? Far from. That said, ONJ brought it, Gene Kelly brought it, the music is great, and I get why it’s a cult classic.
So glad you caught up with our review!
I disagree with Christy on All Over the World. I thought that was the only decently directed musical number in the entire movie. Everything else was just flat, drawn out long shots with almost no editing.
It definitely has a lot more movement to it, you're right.
The weakest link in the film is Michael Beck. He can't sing, dance and has no charisma. I've read that Andy Gibb was originally slated to play the role, who would have been phenomenal. But due to Gibb's drug problems, they went with a Gibb look-a-like, when they should have gone with David Cassidy, Donny Osmond or some other song-and-dance man. Hell, why didn't they call Travolta?
Andy Gibb would have made much more sense.
Neither. I was 15.
That's OK!
It's a bad movie. Great music though. The final song filmed, Xanadu, was poorly filmed and choreographed. Too much was going on. People constantly crossing in front of other people. The camera should have moved to a much higher position. Maybe less dancers and roller skaters would have been better.
It's a mess, and it's too long, but it's never boring!
Happy Birthday Christy!
Thank you!!
Happy Birthday!!
Thanks so much!
Happy birthday!
Thanks, Jon!