Dance, dance...(Dirty Dancing)

Everyone loves the underdog story. How a nondescript personality comes to the forefront and

snatches the glare from front rankers. Emile Ardolino's Dirty Dancing is one such instance. Apparently this 1987 low-budget romantic drama wasn't expected to run more than a week at the theatre, but strangely it went on to become a massive sleeper hit and was also the first film to sell more than a million copies on home video! However, if you watch this Patrick Swayze-Jennifer Grey movie today, this mammoth success will hardly come off as uncalled for. It's a film tailor-made to reap in the moolah. It's smart, simple, sexy, freewheeling, passionate, has a social message and yes... it has Patrick Wayne Swayze, the smooth smouldering dancer!

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Dangerous liaison (Fatal Attraction, 1987)

What depths can a woman plunge to for love? I say depths because Alex Forest does not rise in love.

Or should I call it obsession? She plummets into the most obnoxious and deplorable levels of behaviour in order to get the due attention from the man she starts believing she has a right to. These are all her beliefs. On any given day, a mind with a rational thinking capacity would not like to give any benefit of doubt. But then as they say, 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned'. And in Alex's case, like a psychotic woman scorned!

Adrian Lyne's psychological thriller, Fatal Attraction, the second most highest grossing film of 1987, has an undercurrent of eeriness from scene one itself. There is that constant hangover of danger lurking in the corner. A sense of foreboding, an air of premonition clouds every frame. Even the camera angles and the tints used suggest that things will soon turn awry in Dan Gallaghar's life. Dan (Michael Douglas is tailor-made for these roles) is a happily-married and successful attorney living in New York. His wife, Beth (Anne Archer) is a quintessential home-maker, taking care of the family. She's the loving and doting wife and mother who would not care to challenge her husband's fidelity. The equation is pretty safe and comfortable between Dan and Beth. They have a cute six-year-old girl, Beth. But nothing can be taken for granted...

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