Strictly Ballroom

Strictly Ballroom is a 1992 Australian romantic comedy film directed by Baz Luhrmann, who co-wrote the screenplay with Craig Pearce. The film is the first in his Red Curtain Trilogy of theatre-motif-related films; it was followed by Romeo + Juliet (1996) and Moulin Rouge! (2001).

Strictly Ballroom began as a stage play, originally set up in 1984 by Luhrmann and fellow students during his studies at the National Institute of Dramatic Arts in Sydney. An expanded version of the play became a success at the Czechoslovak Youth Drama Festival in Bratislava in 1986. In 1988, it had a successful season at Sydney's Wharf Theatre, where it was seen by Australian music executive Ted Albert and his wife Antoinette. They both loved it, and when Albert, soon after, set up the film production company M&A Productions with ex-Film Australia producer Tristram Miall, they offered Luhrmann their plan to transform his play into a film. He agreed on the condition that he would also get to direct it.

Plot

Scott Hastings, the frustrated son of a family of ballroom dancers, has been training since the age of six. His mother Shirley teaches ballroom dancing, and his father Doug meekly handles maintenance chores at the dance studio, while secretly watching old footage of his bygone dance competitions as well as Scott's in a back room. Scott struggles to establish his personal style of dance to win the Pan-Pacific Grand Prix Dancing Championship, but his innovative and flashy 'crowd-pleasing' steps are not considered 'strictly ballroom', and as such are denounced by Australian Dancing Federation head Barry Fife.

Scott and his dancing partner Liz Holt lose the Southern Districts Waratah Championships due to Scott dancing his own steps. Three days later, Liz leaves him to team up with Ken Railings, the recent Waratah Championships winner; his partner Pam Short has broken both her legs in a car accident. With Scott now alone only three weeks until the championships, Shirley teams up with his coach Les Kendall, her co-instructor at the studio, to start desperately hunting for a new partner for him. Meanwhile, unbeknownst to both, Scott is approached by Fran, an overlooked 'beginner' dancer at the studio. He eventually agrees to partner with her, intrigued by her willingness to dance "his way".

The pairing faces its first hurdle when Fife, attempting to prevent Scott from threatening the Dancesport status quo, arranges for his partnership with established Champion dancer Tina Sparkle. When Shirley and Les hear the news, they are overjoyed. Fran, happening upon them exclaiming over their happiness about Scott's new dance partner, misunderstands initially and believes they have discovered that she and Scott have become partners. When she realises the truth, she leaves, devastated. Scott pursues her and, although she is hurt, entices her to dance backstage with him, and her anger is forgotten. However, several onlookers witness their dance, including Shirley and Les, who then do everything possible to persuade both Scott and Fran that the best way forward for all concerned is for Scott to forget about Fran and sign on as Tina Sparkle's partner.

Fran, accused of damaging Scott's chances, reluctantly accedes and returns home crestfallen. Scott tells his mother he won't dance with Tina. He follows Fran home, where her overprotective Spanish father, Rico, discovers and challenges him. To appease Rico, Scott proposes a Paso Doble for the assembled company. Rico and Fran's grandmother Ya Ya demonstrate the proper Paso Doble technique and offer to teach the couple, who spend the next week training with Fran's family.

However, Fife intervenes, telling Scott that his father Doug, ruined his own career by dancing his own steps, which he has regretted ever since. Unwilling to upset his parents further, Scott finally decides to dance their way to win the championship for his dad, returning to Liz, after Ken leaves her to dance with Tina Sparkle himself. During the competition, Doug explains to Scott that Fife lied: Fife had convinced Shirley to dance with Les instead of Doug so that Fife could win the competition. It is also revealed that Fife is plotting to sabotage Scott in favour of audience favourite, Ken. Scott runs after Fran and persuades her to dance with him.

In the next round, Scott and Fran make a dramatic entrance and begin dancing, immediately riveting the audience. Fife tries to disqualify them, but Scott's friend Wayne Burns, (having overheard Fife's treachery along with his partner Vanessa Cronin), disconnects the PA system, allowing Scott and Fran to dance a Paso Doble routine that impresses the audience. Desperate, Fife tries to turn off the music, but Scott's younger sister Kylie and her partner Luke interfere until Fife's girlfriend Charm Leachman disconnects the sound system. Fife then disqualifies Scott and Fran, but Doug begins clapping out a beat to enable the pair to continue dancing. The audience claps along, as Scott and Fran resume dancing. Liz, having had a change of heart, turns on Fife and Leachman and restores the music, and Scott and Fran's spirited dancing brings down the house. Doug asks Shirley to dance with him and the whole audience joins them on the floor. As the performance finishes, Scott and Fran kiss.

Cast

John Hannan as Ken Railings
Tara Morice as Fran (Francisca)
Bill Hunter as Barry Fife
Pat Thomson as Shirley Hastings, Scott’s mother
Kerry Shrimpton as Pam Short
Peter Whitford as Les Kendall, Scott’s coach
Barry Otto as Doug Hastings, Scott’s father and Shirley's husband
Paul Mercurio as Scott Hastings
Sonia Kruger as Tina Sparkle
Kris McQuade as Charm Leachman, Barry's girlfriend
Pip Mushin as Wayne Burns, Scott’s best friend
Leonie Page as Vanessa Cronin, Wayne's partner and fiancé and Pam's best friend
Antonio Vargas as Rico, Fran's father
Armonia Benedito as Ya Ya, Fran's grandmother
Steve Grace as Luke, Kylie's dance partner
Lauren Hewett as Kylie Hastings, Scott’s sister
Lara Mulcahy as Natalie
Jack Webster as Terry Best
Gia Carides as Liz Holt
Michael Burgess as Merv Landon

Production history

The film version of Strictly Ballroom was developed from an original short play of the same name. It drew on Luhrmann's own life experience—he had studied ballroom dancing as a child and his mother worked as a ballroom dance teacher in his teens and inspired by the life of Keith Bain (who grew up in the same town as Luhrmann). While studying at NIDA in the early 1980s, Luhrmann and a group of fellow students (including Catherine McClements, Sonia Todd and Nell Schofield) devised a short comedy-drama set in the cutthroat world of competitive ballroom dancing.

Home media

On February 14, 1994, the film was released on VHS in the United States by Touchstone Home Video. This was a home video arm of The Walt Disney Company, who purchased Strictly Ballrooms American distributor Miramax on June 30, 1993. The film was released on DVD in the United States on 19 March 2002 by Buena Vista Home Entertainment, another home video arm of Disney. In Australia, the film was released on VHS in approximately late 1992, by Columbia Tri-Star Hoyts Video (a joint venture between Sony's Columbia Tri-Star Home Entertainment and Australian theater chain Hoyts). The film's Australian DVD release in early 2003 was handled by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment South Pacific, the Australian home video arm of the Rupert Murdoch-owned 20th Century Fox. Fox had financed and released several of Luhrmann's films following his success with Strictly Ballroom, such as Romeo + Juliet (1996), Moulin Rouge! (2001), and later Australia (2008).

Miramax still own the U.S. rights to Strictly Ballroom, in addition to currently owning the U.S. rights to other Australian films they released in the 1990s, such as The Castle, Cosi and Muriel's Wedding. In 2010, Miramax was sold by The Walt Disney Company, with the studio being taken over by private equity firm Filmyard Holdings that same year. Filmyard licensed the home media rights for several Miramax titles to Lionsgate, and on April 30, 2013, Lionsgate Home Entertainment reissued the film on Blu-ray in the United States. In 2011, Filmyard licensed the Miramax library to streamer Netflix (which was then not available in Australia). This deal included Strictly Ballroom, and ran for five years, eventually ending on June 1, 2016.

Filmyard Holdings sold Miramax to Qatari company beIN Media Group during March 2016. In April 2020, ViacomCBS (now known as Paramount Skydance) acquired the rights to Miramax's library, after buying a 49% stake in the studio from beIN. Through this deal, Paramount Pictures became the U.S. distributor for Strictly Ballroom and the distributor for all 700 other films from Miramax's library. Paramount Home Entertainment went on to reissue many Miramax titles on home video, including reissuing Strictly Ballroom on Blu-ray on July 27, 2021, and on DVD on June 25, 2024. In the United States, it was also made available on Paramount's subscription streaming service Paramount+, as well as on their free streaming service Pluto TV.

Reception

Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 72 out of 100 based on 16 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Not all major critics responded positively, with Australian film critic Adrian Martin calling it "amateurish and badly pitched in many respects", while American Jonathan Rosenbaum referred to it as "wretched" and "one of the more horrific and unpleasant movies I've seen in quite some time".

Box office

Strictly Ballroom previewed in Australia the week ending Wednesday, 19 August 1992 on 35 screens, grossing A$204,726 and finishing sixth at the Australian box office for the week. It officially opened on 20 August on 51 screens grossing A$1,216,376 in its opening week, placing at number 2 at the Australian box office, just behind Patriot Games on twice the number of screens. In its second week of release, it reached number one with a gross of A$1,307,825. It was knocked off number one the following week by Lethal Weapon 3 but returned in its sixth week of release after expanding to 85 screens where it remained for 7 weeks before being replaced by another local film, Romper Stomper. It was the highest-grossing film in Australia for the year with a gross of A$21,760,400 and the third highest-grossing Australian film of all time behind Crocodile Dundee and its sequel. It grossed US$11,738,022 in the United States and Canada and eventually took A$80 million at the worldwide box office,

A cover version of John Paul Young's "Yesterday's Hero" by Ignatius Jones
"Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps" by Doris Day
A cover version of Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time" by Mark Williams and Tara Morice

Both "The Blue Danube" and "Time After Time" were played in the 1984 and 1986 Strictly Ballroom stage productions.

Stage adaptation

In May 2011, it was announced that Strictly Ballroom would be adapted into a stage musical and premiere at the Sydney Lyric theatre. It premiered on 12 April 2014. and the Lyric Theatre, QPAC in Brisbane in September 2015.

The show received its British premiere on 30 November 2016 at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds. The show had its North American premier in Toronto at the Princess of Wales Theatre on 25 April 2017.

Legacy

The film has become a staple of pop culture, being referenced in various media worldwide.

Many television series have episodes with titles referencing the film, including Phenom ("Strictly Lunchroom"), Even Stevens, The Suite Life of Zack & Cody ("Loosely Ballroom") and Groove High ("Slightly Ballroom").
The film is frequently referenced on the American iteration of Dancing with the Stars, as well as influencing the name of the original UK version Strictly Come Dancing. Sonia Kruger, who portrayed Tina Sparkle in the film, would also go on to host the Australian version of Dancing with the Stars.