17. DON’T BLAME THE NAME: Many great films have been poo-pooed because of dumb titles. It’s time to let go of your judgement and enjoy one of those.

Based on the book by Horace McCoy (who worked as a bouncer at several dance marathons), this Sydney Pollack-directed film is great but I don’t think I ever want to watch it again. It’s so brutal in the way that it beats its characters into the ground as couples dance for 1,491 hours straight, only stopping for meals and sleep, some dropping from exhaustion, some dropping dead.

People line up at a ballroom in Santa Monica as they’re checked over by a doctor and allowed to move in. Robert Syverton (Michael Sarrazin) is picked to be the partner of Gloria Beatty (Jane Fonda) after her original partner is disqualified for bronchitis. We also meet a sailor named Harry Kline (Red Buttons), a farmer named James Bates (Bruce Dern) and his pregnant wife Ruby (Bonnie Bedelia), an actress hoping that Hollywood will see her by the name of Alice LeBlanc (Susannah York) and her partner Joel Girard (Robert Fields).

The boss of the place, Rocky Gravo (Gig Young), employs so many of the carny tricks that became pro wrestling and then reality TV, as he abuses the early contestants and chases them off before inventing drama between his dancers, anything to bring the audiences back every night. One night, he even tells Gloria that they have to follow through on what they promise to the crowd, as if they don’t, they won’t believe any longer. This is the very foundation that old school kayfabe was built on.

Again, much like wrestling, Rocky has an army of doctors who will drug up and keep the show going. He even employs an angle called the derby where dancers have to race in a circle until the last three couples are eliminated. By now, Robert is dancing with Alice and Gloria with Joel, who leaves, and then Harry. During this frantic scene, Harry dies on the dance floor and Gloria drags his dead body past the other couples. Anything to win $1,500 for dancing for nearly fifty days in a row.

Rocky has another storyline where Gloria and Robert will get married. When she says no, he tells her that even if she wins, he will deduct expenses for her room and board, meaning that all of this is for nothing. A destroyed Gloria tries to kill herself and can’t do it, so she gives Robert the gun and he blows her brains out. When the cops arrive, he says the title of the film.

This movie is filled with actors that probably only I adore, like Arthur Metrano (Captain Mauser, enemy of Mahoney), Severn Darden and “Grandpa” Al Lewis.

Charlie Chaplin wanted to make this movie in the 1950s and it would have starred his son Sydney and Marilyn Monroe. He was accused of being a Communist and he was unable to come back to America.

Screenwriter James Poe was going to make this as a low budget movie with Shirley Knight as Gloria, Lionel Stander as Rocky, Allen Jenkins as Sailor and his wife Barbara Steele would also be in the cast.

I’m glad that this is the version of this film that was made even I felt as emotionally beat up as the couples by the end. It’s harrowing.

You can watch this on YouTube.