A Time article begins this text, detailing the characteristics of 1950’s youth. Many were passive, waiting for their hand to be dealt to them concerning the war. Korea was in the back of their minds, and the threat of the draft forced many to contemplate their future life plans. According to Time, 50’s youth were hard workers and were a relatively calm generation. Women especially were beginning to break from the mold of the “housewife” and began to take a more active role by easing into the position of “career woman”. Though the younger generation did demonstrate its fair share of partying, they kept a limit on their indulgences. The characters in the film Grease seem to fall into the extreme ends of the spectrum of youth described by Time. Sandy, though radically changed by the end of the movie, fell into the “housewife” category that 50’s female youths were beginning to stray away from. Rizzo, on the other hand, took a very opposite stance, and had already settled into a position of female dominance not seen until the 60’s. Though Time found that 50’s youths were calm, hard workers, the youth gangs in the film were comprised of rambunctious, promiscuous teens that were very unlike the settled teens they were supposed to be representing.

    Walkowitz’s chapter “Re-screening the Past: Subversion Narrative and the Politics of History” deals with the radical subjectivism operating within historical films. Walkowitz’s main problem lies within Oliver Stone’s Nixon, and Stone’s overly critical look on the Nixon administration. Walkowitz believes Stone’s left-wing views leave a negative impression of American values. However, Walkowitz is not interested in whether the history behind the film is “good” or “problematic”, but rather how the historians were located concerning the history of these productions. Though films such as Nixon are “fiction”, filmmakers will still strive to achieve legitimacy in the historical sense. This is a problem Grease faces. Though Grease was not a fact-based historical film, nor was it produced in order to form a subjective look upon 1950’s youth culture, its slight distortion of the 50’s culture creates a similar misaligned view of the past. Grease was not created to be used for historical reference, but rather as an escape from the present. However, the misplaced sexual morals of the 60’s within the conservative culture of the 50’s can potentially lead to a misrepresentation of the 50’s decade.

    In Kay Dickinson’s chapter “Cinema, Postmodernity, and Authenticity,” she details a small section on Rock Culture and Youth Movies. “Teen films” in the 50’s and 60’s were used mainly as a platform for performers and performances to reach a greater audience. However, they often also included teenage delinquency involving sex, cars, and other youthful weaknesses. The most popular films of that time involved the “alienated hero” coping with social pressures. This focus on counterculture would lead directly to the use of music to express character emotion. Even before MTV, film successfully linked music with video, and was shifting audio music to visual music. Film in the 1970’s only retrospectively chronicled youth culture. Hence Grease, which was released in 1978, looks back almost 20 years earlier to the class of 1959. Grease fit into the 70’s nostalgia of past youth cultures. Films such as American Graffiti and TV shows such as Happy Days joined with Grease in the idealized and nostalgic look back to the 50’s golden age of youth. Grease, though filmed in the late 70’s, embodies what Dickinson describes as 50’s decade “teen films”. It was a platform for such performers as Sha-Na-Na and Frankie Avalon, and involved teenage delinquency concerning cars (the T-Birds), typical of the 50's, and pre-marital sexuality between Rizzo and Kenickie, typical of the 60's. Grease, in effect, succeeded in included elements of films from the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s.

    Scheiner’s article details the life and myth of Sandra Dee, a 50’s teen icon. Though Dee suffered terribly behind the scenes, a nostalgic view into 50’s frames her as the ideological “goody-two shoes” teen. Scheiner details Dee’s abusive childhood, her rise to stardom, and how the problems of eating disorders, sexual indecency, and womanizing have been covered by the ideological views of the decade. Because of Dee’s earlier Tammy films, her image became synonymous with the wholesomely pure teen she characterized. Though Dee fought an eating disorder and was living with the pain of sexual abuse, her fans only recognized her as a sweet and lovable character. Even after Dee made films in which she broke out of her virginal character into more seductive roles, fans continued to view her as the pure person they always wanted her to be. This tendency to “simplify and idealize” characters and times of the past is exemplified in a song within the film Grease. Rizzo mocks Sandy’s naïve nature, most notably her sexuality, and equates her with Sandra Dee. Though Grease, on one hand, breaks away from the “nostalgic trap” by tackling issues (which don't really emerge until the 1960's) such as promiscuity and unplanned pregnancy, it still idealizes the 50’s decade in which the story takes place. Much like Sandra Dee, the positive aspects of the 50’s represented in the film Grease form a façade over the features of the film (such as sexual morals) which are problems not faced until a later decade.

    In the chapter “A Return to the 1950’s: The Dangers in Utopia”, Dika specifically examines Grease and how nostalgia is particularly utilized in the film. Dika makes a novel observation by claiming that Grease in fact combines the liberated sexuality of the 1960’s with the nostalgic innocence of the 1950’s. Dika realizes that this argument seems contradictory in that the sexual morals of the 1950’s were completely opposite from those of the 1960’s. This synergy of the two decades, however, sets Grease on a rocky path as other elements such as Blacks and gays are still absent from the film. Dika states that the film tries to restabilize itself by returning to the classical musical genre and taking on the form of other 50’s musicals. Grease was released during a time in which the past seemed like a much safer time. Dika suggests that may be a reason as to why older actors and actresses were used to represent high school kids. The older audiences could identify more easily with the older actors, while the younger audience could still relate to the adolescent situations. Dika believes the Grease exploits certain nostalgic elements of a simpler time, but employs a later decade’s morals to more deeply involve its target audience.

    Fuere’s chapter on “The Celebration of Popular Song” highlights the use of reflexive song lyrics in musicals as a way of expressing a character’s emotion, particularly love. Song is created when a character expresses his or herself through music. Fuere feels that this mode of expression creates a heightened sense of importance to the dialogue, as the characters sing rather than speak their lines. Reflexive song lyrics are used throughout the film Grease. Each character has the chance to rise above their spoken dialogue and elicit a more intense emotional scene for their character through song. It’s not just “music over words” as Fuere states, but “song over speech”. Fuere continues by alluding to American popular music’s roots in Jazz music. Though musical songs do not necessarily have the trait of an African-American ethnic origin, or are liberated by the improvisational aspect of Jazz, they share similar ideals. As Jazz is often spontaneous, musical songs will often seem unprompted, or just a natural progression in the dialogue. The songs within Grease often flow from a continuing dialogue between characters. Though the majority of the music in Grease is rock-and-roll, Fuere is correct in stating that the origins of that popular genre of music rest in Jazz.

    Hershberg’s review of Margot A. Henriksen’s Dr. Strangelove's America: Society and Culture in the Atomic Age simplifies Henriksen’s view of the 50’s and how nostalgia for that time period has hidden the slow rise of dissention which eventually resulted in the explosion of freedom of rights in the 60’s.  Popular culture of the 50’s was constantly trying to purvey a way to express the angst hidden behind the peaceful calm of society.  The 50’s were bombarded by the end of World War II, communism, McCarthyism, and the global threat of nuclear war.  However, audiences continue to look back upon the 50’s as the golden age of American society.  Hershberg even admits that Henriksen made him realize that 50’s films such as Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Day the Earth Stood Still were actually clever ways of portraying Cold War angst under the guise of Science Fiction.  Due to the extreme nostalgia Grease attempts to deliver, anxiety over the Cold War and nuclear threat is completely absent from the film.  The neglect of writers and filmmakers to give any attention to national or world politics preserves the sense of a simpler, untainted society.  Unfortunately, as Henriksen might agree, films such as Grease will continue to perpetuate a false, utopian historical view of 50’s society.

    Shumway argues the music in film is key in generating a strong sense of nostalgia.  His section concerning the music of the film American Graffiti directly relates to the popularity and nostalgic values of Grease as well.  American Graffiti led the way for Grease to gain the popularity that it has held on to for so many years.  Shumway defines a certain type of nostalgia he calls “commodified nostalgia,” which the cultural revival of commodities of a past time.  The growth of technology and mass media made it even easier for “commodified nostalgia” to spread.  Relatively recent pasts, such as the 50’s, are more often “packaged nostalgically” and can therefore illicit actual nostalgia in some of the target audience, and will often create a false nostalgia for those audience members who were never a part of the packaged time.  The rock-and-roll songs within the films American Graffiti and Grease are popularized by this “commodified nostalgia” in that many audience members who listened and popularized the soundtracks were not even old enough to have grown up with that music.  Rather, they replace their impressions of the past with the “original” past, and assume the depictions of the past within the film are true to history. 

    Rugg’s article mainly focuses on the nostalgia elicited from music theater.  Though Grease is a film, it began as a show on Broadway written by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey in 1972, and was then adapted to film.  The same nostalgia is connected with the celluloid version, as well as the live performance.  Rugg describes nostalgia is as “longing for a past that never actually existed.”  Familiarity and a sense of connected history evoke emotional bonds between the audience and the characters.  Grease avoids complications such as race issues and sexual preference.  Rugg uses the musical Shot Boat as an example of how race relations jar audiences from the comfortable nostalgia that sets in.  Grease, on the other hand, maintains the comfortable sense of a simple, unproblematic past.  Though problems concerning romantic relationships and rival gangs are major aspects of the plot, there is an apparent but seemingly overlooked lack of cultural diversity within the cast.  Rugg also mentions that musicals will often aim to appeal to children with material that will also draw their parents to the theater as well.  Grease succeeds in doing this by combining teenage angst, adult actors and actresses, and a colorful 50’s decade.  This creates nostalgia in not only adult audience members, but a false sense of nostalgia within younger audience members as well.  

    Though the 1950’s is looked upon with nostalgia for a simpler, calmer time in American history, Whitfield also notes that it was a time of extreme repression and self-control.  Women placidly took on the role of “housewife” in the 50’s, but suddenly fought for independence once the 60’s hit.  Whitfield claims that men and their masculinity, though the backbone of the 50’s family and society, were actually quite fragile.  Especially when depicted in such films as Rebel Without a Cause, and East of Eden, the male hero (James Dean) is troubled by the demands of society.  Masculinity was stretched between two extremes in this decade – the tough soldier and the soft father figure.  This struggle of fulfilling both male roles takes place within the main character, Danny, played by John Travolta.  However society is not forcing Danny to choose between the two extremes.  Rather Sandy, Danny’s love interest (who is facing the same identity crisis) has unknowingly created his fragile situation.  Sandy, unlike other women of the 50’s decade, also undergoes a transformation from one social extreme to another.  Though she typified the young “housewife”-like female in the beginning of the film, she drastically changes to the sexually liberated female typical of the 60’s at the very end of the film.  Both characters had to contend with the fragile social balance 50’s society imposed upon them.