Studio 54

Celebrities. Privilege. Debauchery. Hedonism. We’ve all heard the stories about the most infamous (and legendary) nightclub of all time, Studio 54, but we didn’t have all the facts…till now.

Matt Tyrnauer’s documentary finally tells its full story, and an enthralling, sometimes absurd, sometimes very sad and at times almost unbelievable story it is.

The original Studio 54 lasted for only 33 months. In 98 minutes, Studio 54 captures the club on its best nights and on its worst mornings.

Ultimately, Studio 54 proves a nostalgic, sometimes wistful, other times unsettling look back at a singular period of time.

It’s a tantalizing offer that’s stuffed with celebrity, scandal, hedonism, and riches and all the sex, drugs, and disco that money could buy.

Helped along by news clips, the filmmakers do better with the crash-and-burn business story than with the actuality of the Studio experience.

Studio 54 is a case of a documentary attempting to tell a story that obviously cannot be fully or satisfyingly told at this juncture. As such, it has value only insofar as it suggests how much that era cannot quite be re-captured.