What is the Best Movie Prom?
+ FIFTIETH ISSUE EXTRAVAGANZA
If high school movies are an ice cream sundae, the prom scene is the cherry on top: saccharine, tart, and oddly, maybe artificially, undying. Prom culture is weird, a midcentury occasion as shrouded in ceremony as any religious rite of passage. Why do teenagers have their own genre of black tie clothing? What is a limousine and why are there drunk children in the back? What is the purpose of the oddly paganistic flower-giving-and-adorning ritual? The word prom itself (short for “promenade,” if you were wondering) is oblique and weird, its origins as mystifying as the event.
The prom is cosplay for an adult ceremony that no longer happens — the formal ball. The most formal event I have ever been to is the National Book Awards afterparty, and even that was technically cocktail attire. But prom persists, maybe because it’s too perfect of a button for the four-year high school experience. Yes there’s graduation, but that’s daytime, rented polyester robes, mispronounced names. Prom is watery perfume, synth pop bangers, last chances.
You can probably guess what my high school prom was like re: whether or not I went to it (hint: I write a movie blog). But I can’t imagine any real life prom being as good as a movie one, and not just because there are adults doing the lights, decoration, and music. Even in the worst movies, cinematic prom just has a luster that real life can’t touch.
A lot of famous high school dance scenes aren’t actually at prom. Mean Girls’ iconic dance is the “Spring Fling,” which I assume is the generic variant. Ren McCormack and his peers never actually call their senior dance in Footloose a prom, although the adults do. Hairspray’s dance numbers and Grease’s hand jive take place at a dance competition (the deeply underrated Grease 2 sets the final number at an end-of-year luau).
To celebrate the season (and the fiftieth issue of Deeper Into Movies!), I’d like to hear from you about the prom scenes that have stuck with you. Is there a movie prom that feels particularly memorable, because it’s good, or bad, or something weird is happening in the background? Maybe a scene that made you dream of the day you would slow-motion walk to dance with the twenty-eight-year-old star quarterback? Or a movie that made you fear you’d be forced to participate in a white boy dance off?
Comment below, or vote here, and I’ll share some fun responses. I might even put together a bracket if there’s a robust enough selection. Multiple entries encouraged as long as they’re submitted separately, and all submissions welcome. So go ahead and share your favorite off-brand school dances and scenes from *television* if you must. Together, we’ll figure out what makes a high school prom scene truly great.
Most memorable prom for me is Pretty in Pink because it goes down how you would expect—a teenager picking a meh pretty boy over her bff who would have loved her forever. 🥲🤮
Unfortunately I’ve seen NEVER BEEN KISSED way too many times so I thought of BOTH prom scenes: the original one where Drew Barrymore got egged and didn’t go and her “makeup” prom experience. But overall jt is such a bizarre movie, i wish that wasn’t my most memorable prom.
As a sidenote, big fan of GREASE 2!