For the first in many days, I watched a very exciting and pleasant film in that I don’t have to think about the story but I can just feel the movie itself. Fabulous hip-hop music and awesome dancing performances fascinate me and all other audiences in the theater throughout the movie. With the 4 weeks U.S. box office high-ranked renown, ‘Step up’ gives us excitement and a warming heart impression.
The movie takes place in the slums of Baltimore, Maryland. The main character has a poor environment. His father is an alcoholic who watches TV all day long on a couch, and his mother is a stepmother who is so busy making a living that she cannot take care of her own children. He also has two siblings. One is a half-sister and the other younger brother is the only black boy in a white family showing how his family tree is made.
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Without a goal in life, Tyler (Channing Tatum) just dances and hangs out with his friends to kill time. One day when he hangs around with companies, he makes a mistake, trespassing at a school. Therefore, he is ordered to do community service at Maryland Art School from a court. In the best art school, MAT, Tyler meets Nora (Jenna Dewan) who needs a dance partner for the senior showcase. Tyler, who is confident with his street hip-hop dancing, asks to be her partner. As they practice together, they get along together and fall in love with each other. However, like a difference in the style of their dancing, their environments and thinking are so different. So the conflicts between them get deeper and deeper.
The lead role of this film is taken part by Channing Tatum (Tyler) and Jenna Dewan (Nora). Tatum is famous for being the model of many trendy casual makers like American Eagle or Emporio Armani. Jenna Dewan was a dancer for Janet Jackson and N-sync. Two stars with excellent appearance are well matched with this movie’s genre (high-teen romance). They act so well as dancers who dream to be professional. Especially, if you consider Tatum to be a model, not a dancer, you can see how he practices dancing so hard to make the main character of this movie.
Cinematography comes to the fore when the dancing scene comes. Long shots and close-up shots are well used with the various camera angles to show the performance’s actuality. The performance part at the end of the movie was so realistic that you could feel the atmosphere of the theater.
With the dance, another outstanding part of this movie that makes it more perfect is the music. With the best hip-hop musicians, 16 songs of O.S.T hit the U.S. box office and make two nameless main actors an icon of the new trend. (Hip-hop and dancing)
The director of the movie is Anne Fletcher who has danced since 12 years of age and was a dance director of ‘Bring it On’. Her background, by itself, can be a certified check of this movie as a good dance genre. The director made great performance scenes and he also hired the very best teachers of a variety of dance genres like classic, modern, hip-hop, jazz, and ballet which makes the movie so perfect with the dance. The directors were so professional in making this kind of movie. Also, she becomes a cameo in her own movie.
However, not like the great music and dance, the casting and storyline are so poor and not well organized. Many supporting actors’ acting is so awkward. Especially Mac (Damaine Radcliff), the best friend of Tyler, acting was very bad as a sidekick. He doesn’t play a humorous character well, nether a supporter job. The storyline is so obvious that everybody can imagine the next scene while they watch. It is like a collage of ‘8 miles’, ‘goodwill hunting’, ’honey’ etc. Tyler’s environment is exactly like Eminem’s in 8 Mile, and his community service job is like Matt Damon’s job, a janitor, in Good Will Hunting, and the whole story is similar to Honey.
There is one more topic that could be a benefit or a weak point. It has a number of contrasts in the story, which are ‘white versus black’, ‘street dance versus classic dance’, ‘the rich versus the poor’. In the storyline, those conflicts are mixed together and make good conditions. For example, white people’s life in the movie is depicted as not well educated and poor. It’s like the stereotype of black people’s lives that we have. On the other hand, many black students that are in the M.A.S. have pretty good economic conditions. I wish that it could be a reality. I mean that combination between them is possible to coexist peacefully and conflicts between them can become smaller. In the second instance, there is a contrast between hip-hop dance and classic dance which represents a problem between a minor culture and a major culture. Eventually, this conflict is also solved by the means of fusion – ‘classic with hip-hop’. Lastly, discord between the poor and the rich will be third. It is easily solved by a person’s endeavor in this story. Tyler qualified to enter the school, and Nora got his job in the end. These three results give us hope and dream for a better society. But the flaw is none of these conflicts are fully described. It just shows us the good side of the problem. So, it doesn’t have a real solution. It is kind of idealistic and superficial. That is the reason why it has a bad valuation on its contents.
The best line I choose is that “I’m fighting for something that’s real for the first in my life ”. When Tyler comes back to Nora at the senior showcase, he said to Nora to get her and to help her. A man who wants something a lot should insist on and fight for it even though the barriers are harsh. To achieve this purpose, the man has to be self-confident all the time.
Even though it doesn’t have a solid storyline or great acting, it gives us the fresh joy of dance and music. Therefore I think this movie doesn’t choose dance for romance. It chooses characters to show us the dance, the most important and exciting factor in the sense of sight. Considering B-boying and hip-hop music is a trends of these days. It can encourage your boring life and give you the sensation of a new trend. Therefore, I give this movie 4 out of 5 stars.
In addition, I suggest that you find out what dance genres there are and learn how to dance. After you feel the beat and move, you should try it in a club. Experiences will get you much bigger satisfaction with the film and tone up your life.
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