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BILL STODDART
The Music Machine

click to enlarge

Sphere, London, 1979
price: 95p; 154 pages

The blurb on the back:

Hitting the disco big time…
... that's what Gerry wants. But he's on a downer: broke, out of work, no luck with the girl he fancies most. All he's got going is the disco action at The Music Machine.
Then Gerry hears about the break he's been waiting for. The Music Machine has been chosen as the venue for a spectacular disco dancing contest. And the winners will get a chance to star in a new movie. But Gerry's still got problems - like he could use some dancing lessons, not to mention a partner.
Still, with a little help from his friends Laurie the miracle mover-'n -groover and Clare the explosive disco bombshell - and a lot of luck - it looks like Gerry might be in with a chance. If the heavy opposition doesn't nobble him first ...

opening lines:
As it happened, the rain didn’t really matter.

Don’t know if you remember this movie. Unlikely I guess: even if you did see it, chances are you will have suppressed the memory. I certainly have, even though I know I did see it. (I was working as a cinema projectionist at the time, okay? I got my excuse sorted.)

Anyway, I went to IMDb in an attempt to find out more information, and found that it was directed by Ian Sharp, soon to hit big with the SAS-worshipping Who Dares Wins, that the male star, Gerry Sundquist, committed suicide at Norbiton station in 1993, and that Esther Rantzen made an appearance as herself. I didn’t know that.

Anyway the story’s rubbish: Mr Sundquist plays a character who can’t dance very well, so he gets Patti Boulaye to show him. And along the way he learns a little about what’s really important in life. I was hoping it might have some quaint passages on British life in the late-Seventies, but if there are any, they didn’t emerge from my cursory reading of the book.

The book’s adapted from the screenplay by James Kenelm Clarke, which was itself based on a treatment by Ian Sharp. And it’s unreadable.

not Saturday Night Fever
strike a pose

ARTISTIC MERIT: 1/5
ENTERTAINMENT VALUE: 1/5
HIPNESS QUOTIENT: 2/5

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