Product Details

• Format: Color, NTSC
• Rated: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Sony Pictures
• VHS Release Date: December 2, 1997
• Run Time: 89 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (62 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 0767800761
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #186,668 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

This 1978 throwaway comedy is an episodic affair obviously inspired by American Graffiti and its multiple-story-line structure. Set during a single night at a disco, there are some nine distinctive, character-driven plots going on, including one featuring Donna Summer as an up-and-coming singer trying to get the club deejay to play her record. Jeff Goldblum and Debra Winger are in the mix, too, and while no one's trying to make history with this film, it is funnier and fresher than most reviewers gave it credit for being. --Tom Keogh

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

41 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The Last Dance of the Disco Era, May 18, 2002

By 

Gary F. Taylor "GFT" (Biloxi, MS USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Thank God It's Friday [VHS] (VHS Tape)

THANK GOD IT'S FRIDAY was released just as the disco craze crested, when anything and everything might happen during a night on the town, when sex was casual, and drink and drugs were still regarded in a lighthearted manner, and music wailed and blared with the likes of Gloria Gaynor and K.C. & the Sunshine Band. Within a few years Disco would be publically declared dead--but it still lives on in the recordings... and in Donna Summer's penultimate screen image of the Disco Diva, shimmering in the spotlight beneath the mirror ball with a hibiscus tucked into her hair as she belts out her megaton hit, "Last Dance."

TGIF is best regarded as a cultural artifact, an attempt to show everything that was shiny about the Disco world without any reference to its down sides of sexually transmitted diseases, next-morning-hangovers, and serious drug addictions. The story is slight: a disco is hosting a big dance contest, and every one arrives at the door with personal ambitions. There is, of course, the singer who hopes to hit it big; two underage teen girls hot to be Disco Queens; a sweet young thing who hates polyester and is looking for Mr. Right in the wrong place; and a ladykiller looking to score his next victim. The film is most memorable for the look of the disco, which is the real star of the film, and the cast, which includes several performers on their way up: Jeff Goldblum as the lady killer; Deborah Winger as the anti-polyester good girl; and of all people a very, very young Terri Nunn, who would later score big as the front singer for the band Berlin.

There are all the usual running gags, and as a whole the film is only mildly entertaining. But then Donna Summer steps into the spotlight--and for a few moments everything that was magic about Disco lives and breathes again. For what it is--an incredibly light, mindless bit of tinsel--the film is well done, but it has an extremely limited appeal for a contemporary audience. Unless you were actually part of the disco scene and want to revisit old memories, you're better off catching it on the late-late show. But my oh my... wasn't Donna Summer something special!

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Where's the DVD, July 3, 2003

By 

D. Antus "vinylhound" (Pacific Northwest) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Thank God It's Friday [VHS] (VHS Tape)

It's the 25th anniversary of the films' debut and I believe that it's high time for a special edition DVD to be released. I've noticed that "Saturday Night Fever" and that terrible movie "Can't Stop the Music" have already been released on DVD, so why not TGIF? Get with it Columbia!

33 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars It may have been the way the designer meant the dress to be worn but..., May 25, 2006

By 

D. C. Squires (High in the sky traveling at Mach-2) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Thank God It's Friday (DVD)

...it's not the way the director meant the movie to be seen. Once again the studios have dupped the DVD buying public. This DVD version of the film is not a true widescreen of the movie (meaning as it was shown in theaters during its initial release). It is nothing more than a pan and scan version (full screen version that has been edited to fit a normal analog TV) that has been cropped at the top and the bottom. I began to notice something was askew and got out my well worn and well loved VHS edition and began to compare. (Yes, I love this cheesey movie) Well, to my suprise I was right! When are the studios gonna stop taking the cheap route and begin NOT to dupe the public. This really angers me. I have been waiting to see the movie in all its "glory". "Sony"/"Colmbia" has really lost their integrity with me and I'm sure a few others. What's with the cheap DVD edition -- no extra's -- not even a chapter index. NOT EVEN A PROPER DVD MENU! Generic garbage!Yes the DVD is in high definition (great picture and sound). Yes the price was great. Yes we finally have it on DVD. But I for one want to see the movies I buy in all their spender whather it be an "A" list movie or this one. It is a fond memory and a moment out of my past that was the best time in my life. Shame on "Sony" -- full of baloney.Shame on "Columbia" as well.Movie: ****DVD: *Sony/Columbia: zip! nada!