The Last Days of Disco 

Search for this title on DVD or VHS at Amazon.com.

Director: Whit Stillman
Cast: MacKenzie Astin, Edoardo Ballerini, Jennifer Beals, Kate Beckinsale, Christopher Eigeman

Whit Stillman keeps writing the same movie. The characters all speak with the stultifying self-awareness of the hyper-intelligent, and all of them are so far removed from their actual emotions that their travails almost always seem self-induced and to be honest, silly. Fortunately for us, that doesn't stop all of his movies—"Disco" included—from being wonderfully dead-on and possessing the frequently brilliant turn-of-phrase. Chloe Sevigny ("Kids") and Kate Beckinsale ("Cold Comfort Farm") star as two recent Hampshire grads who come to NYC in 1980 to work in publishing. Happening upon some peripheral Harvard grads, the boys and girls dance, philosophize and fall in love with each other as their worlds come tumbling down around them. Chris Eigeman reprises his roles in both "Metropolitan" and "Barcelona" as Des, the nightclub assistant who justifies his misogyny through verbal gymnastics and references to "Lady and the Tramp"—his presence is magnetic, even during the occasional moments when you wonder where this thing is going.

Everyone looks alike here, and everyone talks with Stillman's freakishly on-the-nose dialogue—all except Sevigny, who shines as the one shy girl who keeps her thoughts to herself and ends up the better for it. Strange in human interaction that the more one talks about their emotions, the less emotion we get to see; cheers to Whit Stillman for letting us in his hilariously stale world. With great music, costarring Mackenzie Astin and Matt Keeslar.

—Ian Williams

Return to Ian's movie reviews.