Xanadu is a 1980 American musical fantasy film written by Richard Christian Danus and Marc Reid Rubel and directed by Robert Greenwald. Starring Olivia Newton-John along with Michael Beck and Gene Kelly in his final film role, the film features music by Newton-John, Electric Light Orchestra, Cliff Richard and the Tubes. The title refers to the nightclub in the film, which takes its name from Xanadu, the summer capital of Kublai Khan's Yuan dynasty in China. The city itself appears in the 1816 poem Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, which is quoted by Newton-John's character in the film.

Plot

Sonny Malone, a struggling self-employed illustrator residing in Los Angeles, has failed to find passion in his art. He tears up one of his sketches and tosses the pieces out his studio window; the wind transports them toward a wall mural of nine dancing sisters that suddenly comes alive when the scraps touch the mural. The sisters fly across Earth, but one of them roller skates through town and deliberately decelerates upon encountering Sonny. She momentarily pauses to kiss him before skating away, confounding him.

Awards