Singing & Grooving in SciFi Movies

Singing and grooving to the music, here's a look at some SciFi movie scenes with a touch of song and dance.

Metropolis (1927) Yoshiwara

Yoshiwara's House of Sin from Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" - a place of illicit activity, beautiful showgirls, and a hangout for the power class. The robot Maria performs a salome style dance and mesmerizes the panting, clubgoers into a lustful frenzy.

The evil robot's seduction triggers a revolt among the workers a portent of things to come at the end of the dance when she sits on a multi-headed dragon/beast, a symbol on the Bible's Revelation' Whore of Babylon. Metropolis' lower levels are flooded to quash the riot leaving the city in destruction.

A Clockwork Orange (1971) Singing in the Rain 
Stanley Kubrick's Dystopian film follows the life of an adolescent boy, Alex DeLarge and his gang, the Droogs. They invade a secluded writer's home beating him and raping his wife while Alex DeLarge belts out his irreverent version of "Singing in the Rain".

Young Frankenstein (1974) Puttin' on the Ritz   
Mel Brooks hilarious satire on the Frankenstein films. Victor Frankenstein played by Gene Wilder trains the Monster (Peter Boyle) for an upcoming press conference- in order to convince the locals that the Monster is "safe". At the conference, they do a song and dance number to the tune of Irving Berlin's, "Puttin' on the Ritz". Dressed in tuxedo and cane mimicking Fred Astaire's "Man about Town", the duo do a tap dance routine and gets a positive response from the audience. The Monster's fear of fire interrupts the act, going on a rampage, destroying Dr. Frankenstein's hopes for the Monster's acceptance by the populace.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) The Time Warp

The longest running film release (thirty-three years) "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" is a musical parody of scifi and horror movies. Stuck with a flat tire, Brad Majors (Barry Bostwick) and Janet Weiss (Susan Sarandon) seek help from a nearby castle inhabited by strange and outlandish costumed people holding an annual Transylvanian convention. The couple watch as the Transylvanians dance "The Time Warp".

Movie audiences get a blast re-enacting live the scenes from the movie. "The Time Warp" the most popular song, comes with instructions on how to do the dance while watching the scene.

Doing The Time Warp:

It's just a jump to the left. And then a step to the right. With your hands on your hips. You bring your knees in tight. But it's the pelvic thrust That really drives you insane. Let's do the time-warp again.

Turn around and repeat the steps

Xanadu (1980) Whenever You're Away from Me

Musical Fantasy starring Gene Kelly, Michael Beck and Olivia Newton-John. Belonging to a family of muses and goddesses Kira (Olivia Newton-John), the Olympian Muse of Dance, descends to Earth as Gene Kelly's inspiration. Gene Kelly's character, Danny McGuire, a former band leader dreams of opening a night club, Kira inspires Danny in a song and dance "Whenever You're Away from Me".

Return of the Jedi (1983)  Lapti Nek + Jedi Rocks

The Max Rebo Band , an eclectic group of alien musicians and singers plays gigs at Jabba the Hutt's palace on Tatooine. "Lapti Nek" was sung by the group in the film's original edition. The band's performance was accompanied by Jabba's two slave Dancers, the Twi'lek Oola and the six-breasted Askajian Yarna d'al' Gargan. The performance is interrupted when Jabba feeds Oola to his pet rancor. In the special edition the song was replaced by "Jedi Rocks" sung by Joh Yowza and Sy Snootles.

Lapti Nek

Jedi Rocks

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) Anything Goes

Kate Capshaw's character, Willie Scott performs the film's opening sequence singing Cole Porter's "Anything Goes" in Mandarin.

Together with chorus girls, they do a Busby Berkley-style number with glitter and legs at the Club Obi Wan.

Back to the Future (1985) Johnny Be Goode

Time-travel comedy by Robert Zemeckis . Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) plays his version of Chuck Berry's "Johnny Be Goode" at a high school dance in 1955. McFly adds some Van Halen and Pete Townshend inspired riffs and moves to the song way before heavy metal rock was born and before Berry wrote the song.

Beetlejuice (1988) Day-O (Banana Boat Song) Dinner Party Scene.

Tim Burton feared the "Day-O" sequence wouldn't go over well, since in his opinion it wasn't very funny. He turned out to be wrong: audiences loved it and think of it as one of the film's most iconic scenes.

Big (1988) Playing the Piano Scene

According to Robert Loggia, on the day they filmed the famous keyboard scene at FAO Schwarz, he and Tom Hanks noticed that doubles dressed like them were on hand just in case the two could not do the dance moves correctly. It became their goal to do the entire keyboard number without the aid of the doubles. They succeeded.

The "Walking Piano" used in the film's trademark scene was created by Italian inventor Remo Saraceni. His many musical inventions grace children's organizations worldwide. As of 2008, his famous Walking Piano was being implemented into a piano instructional game called "Piano Wizard" made by Allegro Multimedia.

The Mask (1994) Gee Baby, Ain't I Good To You

The Mask drops by the Congo Bongo Club watches Tina Carlyle (Cameron Diaz) perform a sexy rendition of "Gee Baby, Ain't I Good To You" (Susan Boyd dubs).

The Fifth Element (1997) The Diva Dance

Tall and all blue Diva Plavalaguna (Maïwenn Le Besco) performs at the Spaceliner, Fhloston Paradise singing an aria from Gaetano Donizetti's Opera, "Lucia di Lammermoor" (voiced by Inva Mula-Tchako). Later the Diva shifts tempo singing and dancing to a pop beat cutting into another scene with the Fifth Element- Leeloo doing a ballet - choreograph fight scene with the Mangalores.

The Diva's vocalization was electronically altered to achieve the extreme tonal range.

Star Trek Insurrection (1998) A British Tar

Captain Jean Luc Picard attempting to disarm a renegade Data distracts him by singing "A British Tar" from Gilbert and Sullivan's "H.M.S. Pinafore".

Dark City (1998) Sway

Alex Proyas' SciFi Film-Noir features Jennifer Connelly as Emma Murdoch singing a sultry version of "Sway" in a local night club. "Sway" was dubbed by singer Anita Kelsey.

Mission to Mars (2000) Dance the Night Away

The Mars crew takes a break and do some zero gravity dancing to Van Halen's song, "Dance the Night Away". Woody with no talent for dancing, takes advantage of the zero gravity environment to fulfill his wife Terri's wishes for a dance.

13 Going on 30 (2004) The Thriller Dance 
In "13 Going on 30", Garner’s character Jenna — a teen who is suddenly transported into an adult woman’s body — re-creates the choreography from Michael Jackson’s 1983 music video for "Thriller" at an event for the magazine where she works.

Learn the "Thriller Dance"

Upside Down (2012) Tango Scene
Kirsten Dunst doing the tango in a dance hall with upside down floors.

Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) Dancing Groot
Groot regrows, dances to Jackson 5’s “I Want You Back”

Battlestar Galactica (1978) The Man with Nine Lives

Acceding requests from his grandchildren to appear on their favorite television show, Fred Astaire asked his agent to get him a role in Battlestar Galactica. Fred Astaire made a guest appearance in the episode, "The Man with Nine Lives" as Chameleon, a con man on the run pretending to be Starbuck's long lost father. One of the memorable episodes of the classic Battlestar Galactica series.

SciFi movies with a touch of song and dance, a musical interlude enhances the film's entertainment value plus a creative advantage for fantastic sceneries. Movie audiences love films (in any genre) spiced up with some singin' and groovin'. It's a beautiful way to liven up the plot or give the audience some side entertainment and becoming the film's memorable moment.

Hope you enjoyed the show and drop by Ferdy on Films, etc for more great posts on the Dance-Movie Blogathon.