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Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Not part of a collection.
If they've really got what it takes, it's going to take everything they've got.
A chronicle of the lives of several teenagers who attend a New York high school for students gifted in the performing arts.
CinemaSerf
Jun 20, 2026 · via TMDB
I think what makes this film work, even now, is that it selected it's stars from a bunch of aspiring and talented individuals whom it was perfectly plausible to believe in. To like and dislike. It has something about it that offers hope, optimism and realism to people from a range of backgrounds whose skills with their feet, their fingers or their voices might well be the only thing saving them from a life of banality in parts of New York that couldn't have cared less if they lived or died. On that score, it also presents a certain transferability to other big cities in the world where mundanity is the currency and where just getting noticed - and not exploited - is an achievement. This centres around half a dozen characters - each with their aptitudes and each with their demons, and it also shows us just how vocational a talent for teaching is, especially when it is trying to develop an interest in the academic amongst the artistic and also of containing the artistic when it, frequently, gets out of control. This is also fairly groundbreaking in that it deals, quite casually but still potently, with issues of education, race and sexuality - and the hostility faced by people who don't conform - espoused well here by Gene Anthony Ray; Paul McCrane and in a more vulnerable fashion by Barry Miller's would-be stand up comedian "Ralph". My own favourite? Well that had to be "Mr. Shorofsky" (Albert Hague) whose sarcastic turns of phrase when trying to teach his more digitally minded student "Bruno" (Lee Curreri) the merits of Mozart and Beethoven often raised a smile. This is more than a movie about a song - albeit Irene Cara at her best, and the fact the the spin-off television series' retained many of the cast and ran for so long shows that this did touch nerves in a 1980s world that was at the height of the cold war and was only just becoming aware of the effects of the AIDS epidemic. It's rough around the edges, but it's also characterful and has an authenticity to it that I think still holds up.
User reviews courtesy of TMDB.
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YouTube
Fandango At Home
Irene Cara
Coco Hernandez
Barry Miller
Ralph Garci/Raul Garcia
Maureen Teefy
Doris Finsecker
Paul McCrane
Montgomery MacNeil
Lee Curreri
Bruno Martelli
Gene Anthony Ray
Leroy Johnson
Antonia Franceschi
Hilary Van Doren
Laura Dean
Lisa Monroe
Boyd Gaines
Michael
Albert Hague
Mr. Shorofsky
Tresa Hughes
Mrs. Finsecker
Anne Meara
Mrs. Sherwood
Joanna Merlin
Miss Berg
Jim Moody
Farrell
Debbie Allen
Lydia
Richard Belzer
M.C. at Catch a Rising Star club
Eddie Barth
Angelo Martelli, Bruno's father
Steve Inwood
Francois Lafete
Victor of Aquitaine
Harvey Finsecker
Ray Ramirez
Father Morales
Isaac Mizrahi
Touchstone, Drama Student
Meg Tilly
Principal Dancer
Loris Diran
Drama Student
Michael DeLorenzo
Principal Dancer
Philip Wright
Principal Dancer
Diana Brownstone
Ballet Dancer (uncredited)
Holland Taylor
Claudia van Doren (uncredited)
Michael Seresin
Director of Photography
Kristi Zea
Costume Design
Alan Parker
Director
Robert F. Colesberry
First Assistant Director
Alan Marshall
Producer
Michael Gore
Original Music Composer
Irene Cara
Songs
Michael Gore
Songs
Dean Pitchford
Lyricist
Lesley Gore
Lyricist
Robert F. Colesberry
Lyricist
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Georgetown
May 16, 1980
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The Stranglers - Live '78, SF
1978
Saddle Leather Law
1944
Sign in to vote
Battle your watched movies head-to-head
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Evil Dead II
1987 · 14 wins
The Dark Knight
2008 · 14 wins
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1978 · 13 wins
Final Destination
2000 · 12 wins
Halloween II
1981 · 11 wins
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