The Step Ups (Steps Up?)
Jul. 3rd, 2012 11:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ivyficInspired by Magic Mike to watch more of Channing Tatum dancing, I finally watched Step Up. (No I hadn't watched it before. I know.)
First--haters gonna hate on Tatum, but I kinda like the dude.
a) He is ridiculously charming. Large chunks of Magic Mike are just him flirting, which I'm fine with cause he's good at it.
b) He's a ridiculously good dancer.
and
c) No, he does not have great dramatic range, but in everything I've seen him in, I've never thought oh, this actor is terrible. I've always thought oh, this character is emotionally constipated. Granted I haven't seen G.I. Joe or any of his other ignominious films, but his acting has always seemed to me to be sufficient for the role. He doesn't play people with gravitas. He plays charming, shallow, cool guys, even when he's playing a Roman centurion, and that works for me.
So, Step Up. Step Up is actually a decent movie, unlike its siblings in the franchise. It has (predictable) plot, it has actual stakes, it has somewhat believable characters, it has not bad acting. And it only has a little fail. And the dancing always takes place in narratively plausible locations.
It might seem odd then...that I prefer the other two.
Basically, Step Up evens out to about a 5 or a 6. Dancing's good, but there's not a whole lot of it. There's only one big group number, and though there's a lot of montages, it felt like you don't end up seeing that much. Cause there's people talking and having a plot and stuff.
Step Up 2 and Step Up 3D, on the other hand, are dance: 10, everything else: 0. The actors are cast for their dance moves and play drama more like animated cardboard than people. The plots are constructed from string, lint, and some gum from the bottom of a shoe. There is race fail all over the place. But holy crap the dancing. Holy crap.
Channing Tatum's a very good dancer, but Step Up just does not devote the love and attention to its dance sequences that its sequels do. Let's face it--Step Up 3D is an excuse for a bunch of music videos. But the fact that the dancing's so good and everything in between is so hilariously ludicrous makes them a lot more fun to watch than Step Up, which is just sort of meh all over.
That reminds me. I need to buy a copy of Step Up 3D...
First--haters gonna hate on Tatum, but I kinda like the dude.
a) He is ridiculously charming. Large chunks of Magic Mike are just him flirting, which I'm fine with cause he's good at it.
b) He's a ridiculously good dancer.
and
c) No, he does not have great dramatic range, but in everything I've seen him in, I've never thought oh, this actor is terrible. I've always thought oh, this character is emotionally constipated. Granted I haven't seen G.I. Joe or any of his other ignominious films, but his acting has always seemed to me to be sufficient for the role. He doesn't play people with gravitas. He plays charming, shallow, cool guys, even when he's playing a Roman centurion, and that works for me.
So, Step Up. Step Up is actually a decent movie, unlike its siblings in the franchise. It has (predictable) plot, it has actual stakes, it has somewhat believable characters, it has not bad acting. And it only has a little fail. And the dancing always takes place in narratively plausible locations.
It might seem odd then...that I prefer the other two.
Basically, Step Up evens out to about a 5 or a 6. Dancing's good, but there's not a whole lot of it. There's only one big group number, and though there's a lot of montages, it felt like you don't end up seeing that much. Cause there's people talking and having a plot and stuff.
Step Up 2 and Step Up 3D, on the other hand, are dance: 10, everything else: 0. The actors are cast for their dance moves and play drama more like animated cardboard than people. The plots are constructed from string, lint, and some gum from the bottom of a shoe. There is race fail all over the place. But holy crap the dancing. Holy crap.
Channing Tatum's a very good dancer, but Step Up just does not devote the love and attention to its dance sequences that its sequels do. Let's face it--Step Up 3D is an excuse for a bunch of music videos. But the fact that the dancing's so good and everything in between is so hilariously ludicrous makes them a lot more fun to watch than Step Up, which is just sort of meh all over.
That reminds me. I need to buy a copy of Step Up 3D...
no subject
Date: 2012-07-04 09:35 pm (UTC)