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Step Up 4: Miami Heat/ Step Up Revolution (PG)
© Unknown - all rights reserved |
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| Tookey's Rating |
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5
/10 |
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| Average Rating |
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4.33
/10 |
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| Starring |
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Ryan Guzman, Kathryn McCormick, Peter Gallagher
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Directed by:
Scott Speer
Written by:
Amanda Brody 
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| Released: |
2012 |
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| Genre: |
DRAMA
MUSICAL
SERIES
SEQUEL
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| Origin: |
US |
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| Colour: |
C |
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| Length: |
99 |
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My oh my, it’s preposterous, but the dancing’s hot. |
Reviewed by Chris Tookey
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In Step Up 4: Miami Heat, two talented dancers – hunky Ryan Guzman and pretty Kathryn McCormick - try and comprehensively fail to breathe life into a tale that attempts to cross Romeo and Juliet with Dirty Dancing. He’s a working-class waiter and street-dancer, and she’s the rebellious daughter of a wealthy capitalist who thinks she should work for daddy, not hang out with all those dirty dancers.
There haven’t been many films this year with a more hackneyed storyline or tackier dialogue. This fourth film in the Step Up series is barely a sequel, as only a couple of minor characters are retained from previous movies in the franchise.
Released in the States under the more challenging title Step Up Revolution, its big idea is that a small team of youthful dancers from the Miami underclass might rise up in revolt against the redevelopment plans of the aforementioned capitalist – that’s Peter Gallagher, giving those evil eyebrows of his yet another workout.
But any notion that this film espouses radical politics is hilariously reversed by the ending, which appears to have been devised by the board of a certain multinational sportswear company. After all that heartfelt political activism, the kids can’t wait to sell out.
I gather some of the performers came from American TV’s “So You Think You Can Dance?” They certainly didn’t emerge from a show called “So You Think You Can Act?”
There’s a ludicrous mismatch between the film and reality. This is one proletarian dance group that appears to have no money, yet manages to keep coming up with fabulous costumes, fully rehearsed dance routines and production values worthy of an Olympic opening ceremony. It also has the miraculous ability to transform itself from around a dozen people into hundreds, whenever this is necessary to fill the screen.
However, no one attends such films for believability, political thought or narrative originality. What matters is the dancing, and it’s astonishing, well shot in eye-popping 3D and surprisingly free of people grabbing their own crotches.
Director Scott Speer doesn’t quite manage to ruin it all with his hyperactive editing, and the museum-set sequence is easily the most inventive of the series. So just sit back and enjoy the choreography – and the most risibly idiotic plotline of the year.
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