Stream This: ‘Saturday Night Fever’ is more than a disco movie

‘Saturday Night Fever’
Netflix Instant

Largely misinterpreted and misremembered as a fun-loving dance movie, this 1977 phenom really breaks down to about 15 percent a euphoric musical time capsule and 85 percent a depressing (yet moving) drama about not being able to get out of your go-nowhere neighborhood. John Travolta’s Tony Manero — in a performance so strong it gives him a lifetime pass, which he’s used time and time again — would probably just be another Bay Ridge palooka if he didn’t have supernatural dance moves. His struggle to do more than show them off at the local club is a mighty one, as he keeps falling back on old habits, including hanging with his sexist-racist-homophobic friends.

It’s frankly amazing that a gritty, grimy drama that barely leaves a small pocket of Brooklyn was a monster international hit, though it almost makes sense. The dancing is so good that you can forget about the rest, just as Tony himself can only losing himself when on the floor. And there’s a lot to forget: the assaults on Hispanic neighbors, the business with Tony’s ex-priest brother, the part where our hero tries to rape the female lead. When he’s hoofing everything else vanishes; when he’s not everything crashes down to earth. And by the way, everyone: stop doing the pointy arm thing when “Staying Alive” comes on. Travolta has about 50 better moves in the “You Should Be Dancing” number alone.

‘They Came Together’
Netflix Instant

“State” alum and “Wet Hot American Summer” director David Wain should have better things to do than to make a light, not too savage parody of rom-coms, and ditto stars Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler. But this lampoon still offers some strong goods, though the two best bits don’t even have anything to do with the genre being sent up. And it gets loopier as it goes on. By the end it’s not even a mere “Not Another Romantic Comedy” (or for that matter a “Wet Hot American Summer”) and closer to Wain’s real gifts: grouchy eccentricitiy.

‘Bluebird’
Netflix Instant

If this tiny drama is any indication, John Slattery will have a long, diverse life after “Mad Men.” Here he plays a taciturn small town factory worker whose bus driver wife (Amy Morton) nearly lets a little girl under her watch die. That’s almost the same plot as Atom Egoyan’s “The Sweet Hereafter,” though “Bluebird” goes in a different direction, and conjures up a different mood. It’s a film where no one wants to talk about their roiling feelings, while ace cinematographer Jody Lee Lipes (“Martha Marcy May Marlene”) creates a wintry, low-lit look that’s downright claustrophobic.

Follow Matt Prigge on Twitter @mattprigge