Review: When you watch American Swing, you’re going to see a lot of sex, hear from a lot of people whom you will hope won’t go into too much detail, and you might possibly be impressed at the variety of ways the documentary enters, explores, and plays around with the film’s themes (yes, I know...gross). The film moves through a lot in a little amount of time.  From the humble beginnings and the kind of creepy thrill surrounding the start of Plato’s Retreat, to its boom and eventual problems that led to its downfall, the film handles a lot of personal and public subjects. From one interviewee’s early quote that the seventies amounted to the wildness of the sixties finally being enacted to a scene at the end of the film where a former patron explained that the eighties became the time “when sex was terrifying,” the film creatively explores those changes and why they ended up happening. The film smoothly transitions between many stages of the history of Plato’s Retreat, and even though the steps of success and downfall seem stereotypical, the narrative doesn't at all feel forced or uninteresting.  It came as no surprise that the club would become big, or get a new and different crowd, or one day be met with lots of opposition, but the doc manages to not feel that predictable. Another great part of the story is how many people talk about the famed resort.  Frequent club guests lined up among business associates and relatives of Plato’s Retreat proprietor Larry Levenson to explain how the place helped change or shape their lives. The documentary is far from perfect technically and it does not cover everyone’s favorite subject, but the individual interviews got to me here.  I really enjoy documentaries that focus about very specific segments of historical events and then move into how that particular angle connects to the bigger picture.  In this film’s case, the club’s link to the discovery of AIDS makes a strong impact. On the other side, the old footage used throughout the film is great but some of it is really overly light or blown out, so even though it’s probably not the filmmaker’s fault, the spotty images took me out of the narrative more than was necessary. I did wonder, though, where the film’s footage and pictures came from, and whether people who had visited Plato's back in the day perhaps later saw the film on a whim and recognized a lot more of the scenery than they expected to. The only other minor issue (I wouldn’t call it a full problem since this sort of thing needs to be expected) is the nearly extreme amount of nudity in the film.  If you’re interested in seeing the story without that imagery, you should probably read a book about NYC’s swinging scene instead.  But if you see American Swing, just know you’re pretty frequently going to see stuff.  A lot of stuff.  And it's not always pleasant...but isn't that kind of part of the whole experience? Review by Ryan Pollyea Informative: 2.5- There’s not too much to talk about other than what I expected to hear about plus an informative section on AIDS in the 80’s Entertainment: 3- It hits a lot of topics and keeps the story going very well Technical: 2.5- Lots of visual problems stemming from the quality of film/video originally used to document the place Overall: 3- Not a date movie or one for a lazy afternoon, but it’s still a good watch that really gets the viewer into a specific time, place and mindset
 
Format: Netflix Instant Year: 2008 Running Time: 80 minutes Distributor: Magnolia Home Entertainment Producers: Christian Hoagland et al Directors: Jon Hart and Matthew Kaufman Date Reviewed: 8-4-2009 Story: Mathew Kaufman and Jon Hart direct this documentary that chronicles the rise, heyday and decline of New York City’s Plato’s Retreat, the legendary sex club that catered to adventurous heterosexual couples in the 1970s and beyond. Featuring frank interviews with former members and graphic footage of the club’s activities, the film explores how a once-thriving center of free love imploded amid drugs, tangled relationships and the rise of AIDS (Netflix).