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It is 1967, and Baby Houseman (Jennifer Grey) is a doe-eyed innocent, off on vacation with her family in the Hamptons for a summer of fun, frolic, dance and sandbox romance. But this summer will be the one of Baby's coming-of-age: a mere few minutes after stepping out of the station wagon, she falls in hot puppy love with the studly dance instructor Johnny Castle (Swayze). But her dear old dad (Jerry Orbach) does not care much for Johnny's "rebellious attitude" and penchant for secret nights of "dirty dancing," where the staff bump and grind to all that loud and nasty rock 'n' roll. What is poor Baby to do? As much as she idolizes her proud papa, she still wants to do the horizontal mambo with Johnny. Ultimately, idealism will prevail - it is no spoiler to reveal that it all ends with a big dance number and the bridging of the generation gap. In the immortal words of Madonna, music makes the people come together. The bourgeoisie, and the rebel.

Dirty Dancing is the perfect summer movie musical: sweet, silly, well choreographed and featuring a great soundtrack of classic R&B hits. It is also syrupy, sentimental and pretty stupid, and its other soundtrack suffers the indignity of the likes of Eric Carmen and a group actually called The Blow Monkeys. It is the kind of marketing merger perfected in the 80's - baby boomer nostaglia mixed with hip casting and MTV-ready montages. That such a trifle of a movie actually proved to be such an unexpected and inexplicable box office hit is either really funny, really subversive or really, really scary.

I happen to like most of Dirty Dancing. I don't care that the story is utterly predictable and manipulative. Every generation needs their West Side Story or Grease (not that Dirty Dancing can hold a candle to either of those two genuine classics), so can we fault the teens of the 80's for getting stuck with Swayze and Grey and not John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John? The flick is well made, the performances winning, and the dance sequences, while stagey, are fun. And I'm always a sucker for the 80's Pop Music Montage, which Dirty Dancing refined to the nth degree - watch Baby and Johnny frolic in the river, flirt-cute on the dance floor, and make love passionately while the editor dissolves to the sunrise. This is the kind of stuff teenagers should be watching; if all of us, like Baby, must eventually mature and embrace the realities of the adult world, that doesn't mean we should deny those that follow behind us the same youthful pleasures. So give Baby and Dirty Dancing a break. It may rate as a footnote at best in the pantheon of modern musicals, but is that not more than enough?

Video: How Does The Disc Look?

You would think that after releasing Dirty Dancing for the third time, Artisan would finally have gotten it right. You would think wrong. This 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer isn't particularly good: the print is grainy, dark and lacking in fine detail. Colors are dated and slightly washed out, but made even worse because it appears they were overpumped during the telecine process, which results in noise and a very artificial look. Edge enhancement is also present, which results in jaggies and attenuated ringing. On the plus side, blacks are solid and there are no major print defects, but it is faint praise when a transfer looks as fake, lacking in detail and un-film-like as this. A disappointment.

Audio: How Does The Disc Sound?

At least Artisan put in a better effort with the soundtracks. Would you believe Dolby Digital Surround EX and DTS 6.1 ES Discrete remixes!? (Yes, the apocalypse is here.) Unfortunately, despite the considerable time and money spent, there just isn't that much you can do with a film like Dirty Dancing. A low- budget affair, frequency response is perfectly fine but even all remixed and jazzed up, no great shakes. Stereo separation, especially on the pop songs, is very good, but surround use is sporadic and not particularly effective. Even the DTS ES mix sounds artificial and gimmicky; ambiance is minor and discrete effects are only somewhat successfully integrated into the mix. Low bass is good but not superlative. Both of these remixes are perfectly fine, and only hampered by the limited fidelity of the original source material.

An alternate English Dolby Digital 2.0o surround mix is also included, along with English and Spanish subtitles and English Closed Captions.

Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

The DVD format has reached new depths of shamelessness with the release of the Dirty Dancing Ultimate Edition. At this rate, what's next? A Boat Trip Ultimate Edition? The Carrot Top Complete DVD Collection? The Critters Quadrilogy? None would be any more silly than this, and the overall cheapness of the affair is evident from the lack of craft inherent in these supplements. It doesn't appear that Artisan put much effort or care into giving this set the final polish it needed to be truly great. Instead, we get a mix of raw materials and regurgitated promo items from past releases. It is pretty shoddy, and only gets by because all of the schlock is kinda charming.

Let's go in reverse and start with all of the fluffy stuff on disc two. We get the original theatrical trailers for Dirty Dancing and its upcoming sequel/remake/reimagining Havana Nights, plus three music videos for the immortal "Hungry Eyes," "(I've Had) The Time of My Life" and "She's Like the Wind." The 8-page collectible booklet is just a bunch of adverts for new Dirty Dancing Ultimate Soundtrack CD release, Havana Nights and the disc's extras. Then there is the crown jewel, the complete 90-minute Dirty Dancing Live In Concert mega-special, which must be seen to be believed. (Better yet, don't see it.) Boy, were the 80's a horrible time in entertainment: this poorly staged and choreographed mess is virtually unwatchable, even as camp. The only highlight is Eric Carmen's hair, which threatens to burst through the roof of the ampitheater. Parental discretion advised.

Next we have some thrifty making-of materials. Over 40 minutes of new interviews are included, featuring Jennifer Grey, choreographers Kenny Ortega and Miranda Garrison, and writer Eleanor Bergstein. Alas, all are poorly shot and recorded (the Grey interview is marred by plenty of outdoor noise, including crickets) and there is no shape or form to the material. Why not craft this into a real featurette? (Because perhaps that would actually involve spending money?) And where is Swayze? There is also a 12- minute Tribute to Emile Ardolino, the late, great director of Dirty Dancing. But this, too, is just more interview snippets strung together. More entertaining is Grey's 3-minute screen test, where she continually messes up lines, although her effortless rappaport with the camera is obvious. And if you are really crafty, you'll also find a few easter eggs, including EPKs for both the sequel and the original, which is the only place you'll find any interview footage with Swayze, co-star Cynthia Rhodes or Ardolino.

Wrapping it up are three commentaries on disc one. The writer's track with Bergstein is a holdover from the previous DVD, but it is actually preferable to the new commentary with Ortega, Garrison, director of photography Jeff Jur, costume designer Hilary Rosenfeld and production designer David Chapman. Bergstein is heartfelt and informative, as her script closely paralleled her own experiences growing up. The tech track, however, just isn't that interesting, because no one is given much of a chance to say anything of great depth, and really, how interesting is the making of Dirty Dancing, anyway? Finally, another easter egg is a hidden subtitle fact track, which is full of pop culture factoids and Dirty Dancing tidbits, including plenty of cast and crew bio information. Fun, but slight.

DVD-ROM Exclusives: What do you get when you pop the disc in your PC?

No ROM extras have been included.

Parting Thoughts