Tag: Comedy

Family Weekend I probably could have gone my whole life without seeing or even really knowing it existed. It wasn’t on my main dvd relese website, wasn’t in theaters, it is a film I’d have to have seen on accident.

So let’ just say that. Yeah. I saw it on accident. (Cough)

But it appears to feature bondage, so it already has that going for it.

The Smith-Dungy family is pretty unique, and yes they are one of those families. You know. Free spirited. Kind of. Alright, everyone has a unique personality that is set to 11. Emily (Olesya Rulin) is the oldest daughter and a champion jump rope speed jumping champion. Just ask anyone, like her crush Chris (Chase Maser), how great she is. She just qualified for states this weekend! But don’t ask her family. They didn’t show up to her competition.

Fuckers.

Her mom (Kristin Chenoweth) is now super busy doing business stuff, always on the phone or texting about work. Her dad (Matthew Modine) is too free spirited, an artist, willing to talk about too much and is just in general forgetful. She has an older brother Jackson (Eddie Hassell), who is gay (/faking gay) and and artists. Lucinda (Joey King), a younger sister, who is really obsessed with acting out as characters from famous older films for some reason, and a younger brother who likes animals and has a perfect memory.

Well, Emily decides that her parents need to relearn what it means to be good parents, like they were before, and must undergo some nice reconditioning, tied up for a few days, before they stop being such dicks. Chloe Bridges is also in this movie.

I always knew jumping rope would lead to adultnapping.

For a random movie requested for me to see, it wasn’t all bad. No, the plot overall went exactly where I thought it would go, and all lessons got learned, but the journey to end had its own twists or turns.

Kind of. Now I am just being vague, and I apologize, but this might be the quintesential 2/4. Not 2 out of 4 for being average, but by having equal parts I liked and disliked, turning it average. The former version is just average throughout, never really fantastic or shitty.

Olesya was pretty believable as an overachiever finally snapping and really wanting to do good, without realizing she has reached almost insanity. Her siblings Joey King and Eddie Hassell are both immediately forgettable, but since they don’t go away, they reach annoying levels. The parents are both pretty unique and interesting in their own ways, but of course they set up the dad to be the cool one and the one who is more willing to change. Despite making him more likable to the viewer, they are (for a little bit) able to allow us to feel some sympathy for the mom.

The unfortunate downside of this film is none of it just feels real or natural. It all feels fake, it just feels like a movie. The acting isn’t incredible anywhere, so I don’t think these characters actually changed, which just ruins the ending for me (which was a let down on its own). Hard to describe, but just doesn’t work on the most basic level. Despite that, I still enjoyed the idea of the premise, and some parts.

How many typos are in this review?

Aw yeah, technically my first review of a stand up special ever.

Why this one? Why now? Well, I don’t plan on reviewing stand up specials pretty often. Not only because they mostly just appear on Comedy Central/HBO first, or some guys website for $5. No. They are just strange to review. I don’t know if I can measure my laughing amount on a scale too easily. In fact, most of these I do laugh throughout, except the occasional odd one out. It would be too difficult.

So why this one? Well, Kevin Hart: Let Me Explain was given a theatrical run, not in my area, but it still got one damn it, and I didn’t get to see it. Like a bitter ex, I have waited for it to finally come out on DVD just so I could review it for this website.

That tight clothing got even tighter when the fire came out.

Turns out the Trailer was very misleading for what this movie was about. It shows he went on a world tour, got into shenanigans, and did comedy. Like most concert films, all of the performances/material are actually taken from one show, and yes, that show is usually Madison Square Garden. But in between songs/performances, we normally get to see the performers doing fun stuff around the world. Not in this film.

I’d say about the first 15 minutes or so started off with a skit, and then went into travel the world mode, where we saw him for a few minutes, do zany things around the world. Then the next 60 minutes is his stand up routine presumably uncut, all in one go without any breaks, then the film ends with some more running around in the credits. That is it.

So basically, it is just another stand up special. There is very little not stand up special, and I don’t get to see what the trailer is about 50% of. So those scenes in the trailer? Most of them appear in the dang credits, so as the movie was ending I was more confused than anything.

As for Kevin Hart‘s stand up, sure it was funny. Most of this hour was dedicated to really long stories about his fame and overreactions. Some hit hard, some missed. Oh well. After it is over, I can only really remember a few that I truly laughed at, but for a comedy special, having those moments is still gold and still worth it.

I am just disappointed there is nothing really unique about this whole affair, despite being in theaters, and the misleading trailer.

Machete started out as a fake trailer in front of the Grindhouse movies, Death Proof and Planet Terror. Robert Rodriguez decided that the fake trailer needed to be made into a real movie and Machete was born! A movie that was made on purpose to be bad, it had plenty of potential, but to me just felt boring. I wasn’t impressed.

I basically forgot about the franchise until they announced both a sequel and a third film coming down the pipelines. The sequel, Machete Kills just hit theaters, but the third film really caught my eye thanks to its title of  Machete Kills Again…In Space. With a name like that, this franchise can’t be that bad!

Yeah, it looks like he is about to kill it here.

After the death of his partner (Jessica Alba), Machete (Danny Trejo) finds himself at the wrong end of the law, blamed again for a murder he did not commit. To get out of the jam, the President of the United States (Charlie Sheen / Carlos Estivez) has asked him to go on a suicide mission into Mexico. His mission? To stop revolutionary/mad man Mendez (Academy Award Nominated Demian Bichir) from sending a nuke straight to Washington DC.

Sure, a simple enough mission, but there are a lot of factors that stand in his way. Million dollar bounties, crazed heart monitors, multiple personality disorders, priests seeking redemption, a hitman called El Camaleon, brothels, space scientists that know the future, a madam with a grudge, former friends, and clones stand between him and his goal.

There are so many celebrities, trying to list them all would be insane, but I will do it anyways. Telling you their role in the film almost seems like a disservice, and plus, you probably wouldn’t believe me. The movie includes Mel Gibson, Amber Heard, Michelle Rodriguez, Sofia Vergara, Lady Gaga, Antonio Banderas, Walton Goggins, Cuba Gooding Jr., Alexa Vega, and Vanessa Hudgens!

One of the best “jokes” in this movie is having Alexa Vega in close to nothing. Since he worked with her on Spy Kids 12 years ago.

As I mentioned before, Machete was trying to make a good/entertaining “bad movie,” in honor of all the poor quality B-movies of the 70s/80s. It is pretty hard film type to make correctly, the last one I really enjoyed being Black Dynamite. The first film had a lot of appropriate jokes for genre, but the overall plot and tone bored the crap out of me.

Machete Kills corrects these mistakes and more. First off, it was actually entertaining. Over the top action from start to finish and nonsensical plot lines that will cause you to stare at the screen in confusion. Normally that would sound terrible, unless terrible was the goal, in which case it sounds great! Machete Kills put a lot more detail into purposefully editing the film in a sloppy way to increase its humor potential. The film has a rampant disrespect for obeying the natural laws of our reality: where a broken car can drift 500 miles in mere hours, and where several days can pass in only 20 minutes.

Most of the jokes are smaller references or in the background, outside of the absurd characters themselves. Despite how outrageous everything is, the characters themselves for the most part are incredibly serious. After all, their lives are on the line. The movie sports a lot of death and violence, which is all packaged in creative ways.

Machete Kills improved a lot from the first film, but I think it still has a lot of untapped potential that it just hasn’t reached yet. Assuming the third film actually gets made, it might finally cross into the “So Bad, It’s Amazing!” territory that the series is striving for. As for now, it is not a must watch, but more of a watch eventually (maybe) type of movie.

Joss Whedon is a sly bastard.

While working on post production for The Avengers in 2012, he had to take a vacation via his contract. What did he do on his vacation? He fucking filmed this movie, Much Ado About Nothing, in twelve days. TWELVE! A WHOLE MOVIE! In secret!

Who makes a film in secret? That guy does.

For those of you who don’t know, Much Ado About Nothing was also a film in 1993, but it had stars like Denzel Washington, Keanu Reeves, and Robert Sean Leonard (when he was known as that guy from Dead Poet’s Society, not Wilson FROM House M.D.).

That version wasn’t bad in any real way. It was super Shakespeare. It was done well, and everyone did good. Yes, even that guy.

Basically the best actors the world had to offer us in 1993.

Ah love. Love is grand. And sometimes leads to marriage. That is the goal of one Don Pedro (Reed Diamond)! He has fallen madly in love with Hero (Jillian Morgese) and has vowed to win her hand in marriage, but he needs some help from his friends.

Oh wait. That goes on as planned pretty easily (minus some second act shenanigans and mix ups). That is because they are not the main characters of the play/movie! No! It is Benedick (Alexis Denisof), friend of Don Pedro, and Beatrice (Amy Acker), friend of Hero! Both are known for their wit and their disdain for love and fairy tale endings. Nonsense all of it! Well, weddings take some time to plan, so Don Pedro, his friend Claudio (Fran Kranz) and the others get a bit bored with the wait and decide to play a game. They will make Beatrice and Benedick fall in love with each other!

Ha ha, emotions! Hilarious!

Well, yes, other things happen in the progress. But who cares. We got people being tricked into love! Who cares about the rest? Sean Maher plays the mean spirited Don John, Clark Gregg plays Leonato, Hero’s dad, and Nathan Fillion plays Dogberry, the constable.

Oh yeah, it is filmed differently too.

So, why did Joss Whedon choose to make this secret movie? I have a theory. I think he just really likes this story, and damn it, he wanted to do a modern Shakespeare movie. Simple as that. This is one of the clearest definitions of a pet project I have ever seen. He made his first black and white movie, a movie with a script he didn’t write (technically. He wrote a screen play…but you know. Not really), it has a lot of his actor friends, and it was done in secret. I seriously still can’t believe that.

Now, the question I ask is…did this movie need to get remade already? There are a lot of Shakespeare plays, and many that don’t have plays. We are about to get our fiftieth film adaption of Romeo and Juliet (roughly). The answer is no, it didn’t have to get made, but no movie has to get made.

For me to really enjoy this, I would hope that this film offered something new. Well, new wise, it is filmed in black and white, and in a modern setting. There is also one subtle big difference, alluding to the past of Beatrice and Benedick, that I am pretty sure has never been done before. But honestly, it doesn’t feel like enough. Modernizing this really didn’t mean much when it is just a big house party, really. Unlike Coriolanus, which was definitely changed for a modern way, and Romeo + Juliet, which was beyond weird.

The acting was decent. It was a bit weird seeing all these people we know from other things doing Shakespeare, but that is to be expected.

I just don’t think this was different enough or unique enough to be considered really great.

I am now a man on a mission. I really do want to watch all of these shitty dance movies no one has heard of. The only reason is because Stomp The Yard was a better movie than I gave it credit for.

So I had been judging all of these movies, some of which I have heard and most of them I never knew existed, just because of the genre, dance. They can make a good dance movie. I believe in them. The dancing just has to be amazing, and a plot that isn’t stupid. That’s all we want, people.

Which is why I found a list of dance based movies over the last few years, and the first one on that list is Battlefield America. Wow. That movie sounds super intense. I cannot wait.

Wait. Uhh. Erm..What? Kids?

Sean Lewis (Marques Houston) is a lawyer, and pretty good at his job. In fact, he is going to make partner soon! Unfortunately, he gets into some trouble. He has to do community service. He also thinks he is better than just picking up trash, so he wants a better community service.

Well, the judge has officially changed his mind. He can teach kids how to dance. What? He doesn’t dance himself, either. Apparently they just need a leader. Because they are bad on their own.

So he hires a choreographer, and hangs out with them.

So what kind of dance is this? Ballroom? No. Swing? No. Tango? No.

Street battle hip hop. You might be asking yourself, why in the fuck do 10 year olds need to learn that? Yeah. Exactly. Well, in this alternative universe place, there is some competition called Battlefield America, where it is for kid groups to battle dance each other…

…And it is popular and people watch it? And find it exciting?

…

…

I just. I just don’t know really what to say anymore. Tristen M. Carter and Chandler Kinney play two of the main kids, Mekia Cox works at the community center, and Christopher Jones plays the coach of the best dancing crew over the last three years.

In case you were curious, the main star was of course this kid in Sister, Sister.

The whole time I watched this movie, something felt inherently wrong. It took me awhile to figure out what it is.

For a dance movie, it does show a lot of dancing, just of other crews. At least four times throughout the film, they have these 1 on 1 dance battles, each one featuring the crew that always wins the last three years. They are on the left side of my picture up above, and the underdog crew this film is about on the right. Each of these dance scenes were actually really long, with constant changes from the crowd, back to the dances, to the other dances. It flashed around a lot. It would have been cooler to see it all in one fluid motion, but whatever. The main point is the camera angle for the dance was always placed super low, and aiming up, because these are all kids. It had to be really low.

It felt awkward. It felt uncomfortable. It was a bunch of young kids doing dancing that they shouldn’t be doing yet, pre puberty.

Then I came to the realization. This is a movie for pedophiles. That is literally all I could think about. Seriously. Here is the opening credits scene, about three minutes long. Tell me you can watch it and don’t feel uncomfortable and potentially nauseated.

There is so much of that in this movie, outside of the shitty cliches and similarities to The Mighty Ducks. I am giving it the 0 because of how uncomfortable and awkward it made me feel. I wanted to burn the movie when I took it out of my player, but I didn’t want to have to pay for a new copy at the rental store.

Watching these dance movies is apparently going to take me down a really fucking strange and creepy path, one I don’t know if I am ready for anymore. Just. Just holy fuck, was this movie awkward.

Fright Night 2: New Blood.

Why? Why not, I guess. I mean, I liked the Fright Night remake. I also liked the original Fright Night. It is crazy how that can happen.

The original had a sequel to, called part 2. Did you know that? Of course not, I think no one knew that. I don’t think this is a remake of the sequel though, because the sequel at least had the same characters. This one is completely new out of left field.

But a similar sized and shaped field overall. Just the left side of one.

Honestly, I might mess up some of this plot. Charley Brewster (Will Payne) and his best friend, ‘Evil’ Ed Bates (Chris Waller) are in some strange college program in not-America. They start with a night class, and oh snap, their history teacher is Hottie McHotterson, Gerri Dandridge (Jaime Murray). Charley claims he saw her doing some lesbian stuff across the street before class, but no one believes him.

Well, the pervert continues to look out of his window, and eventually he sees some weird shit, so he goes over to investigate. Oh no. She is a vampire and some fucked up ritual shit is happening.

Even his somewhat new girlfriend, Amy Peterson (Sacha Parkinson) doesn’t believe him. I mean, why would they?

It isn’t until he can finally convince Evil that they decide to get Peter Vincent (Sean Power), famed vampire and unusual being hunter to investigate the teacher. He hosts the show Fright Night, so maybe he can get to the bottom of this. Unless he is a fraud. And unless the teacher doesn’t kill them first.

Please turn to page 7 for a detailed analysis of why this scene pissed me off.

I am having a hard time figuring out what is up with this movie. It has elements that are very similar to Fright Night, yet it is very different plot wise than fright night. Like the vampire is a chick, different. There is a famous vampire hunter guy who isn’t as cool as he seems, same. There is a best friend obsessed with the guy, who later becomes a vampire, same. But everything else is different. So I feel like it was supposed to be a reboot. But they labeled it as a sequel to a remake? My head hurts. Oh, let’s not forget that the main character, his friend, and the vampire hunter share the same name? What in the fuck is going on?

(The plot was worse than Fright Night and the movie was no way near as humerous or cheesy. Lame).

So basically, a generic vampire movie that is just cashing on the…okay success of the last movie.

But what really really bugged me maybe more than it should have was the long ending in a big fountain of blood. It was in a cathedral like area. Either way, cool big fountain of blood, that is feet deep that involves lots of fighting and thrashing about in it? The blood doesn’t look real, it looks like cranberry juice, or red colored water. The blood doesn’t stain any clothing or skin either. It just comes off in small red clear drops…like water. It took me out of the element completely, and I felt like there was nothing that could be done to make up for it. And honestly, I was right.

Just fuck it. Strangely enough, this is the second movie in a week I have reviewed that had nakedness in it, but not from the main female character. That isn’t the weird part. The main female character in both have been naked before in Dexter. THAT is the strange coincidence. The other one was Humans Versus Zombies. (Sorry for perving, it was just really weird).

Yeah. We got a movie called Humans Versus Zombies.

Yeah, it was inspired by the live action game played on college campuses around the (world?) US.

Yeah, it was low budget and went straight to DVD. Well then, shall we?

But they know their audience. Bring on the nerd jokes!

This movie takes place, surprisingly, around a nondescript university. Something else nondescript happens in the world, and some homeless people might end up biting some people. But that doesn’t matter. Because it is Humans vs Zombies week at this university.

Cool, they can use nerf guns too! Our movie opens up with some rule disputes, but they are pretty pathetic.

Well, actual zombies start to appear, much to our main characters surprise. Who to we have? Random hot party girl Amanda (Melissa Carnell) who normally wouldn’t hang out with these guys. Virgin nerd who predicted zombies first and plays MMOs Danny (Jonah Priour), and he likes Amanda. Internet gamer girl who has a webcam show about games, causing nerds to send her free shit, Tommi (Dora Madison Burge). A jock-ish guy who actually likes her and her show, James (Jesse Ferraro). Dude who really fucking loves killing zombies and this whole thing, Brad (Chip Joslin). And of course, war vet turned campus security guard who is really good at killing zombies, Frank (Frederic Doss).

Yeah, fuck you, you just get humans, no zombies.

Ho hum. Well, like most low budget comedies with some horror elements, this one failed to entertain for long. To be fair, it had its moments, namely from the “nerdy virgin” character. One area, near the end, he developed a huge strategy for getting his group out of the hardware store to a more safe location using knowledge he learned from MMORPGs. They had a tank, DPS, healer, range, and wild card. Alright, the Wild Card might be more of a It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia reference. But still.

But one interesting scene does not fix the bunch. Most of it is so low budget feeling, the zombies are never scary, just ridiculous.

Having the college game component was such a non important addition to the film, this could have been any generic bad zombie movie. It maybe mattered for only five or so minutes, and used it as an easy way to introduce extra characters. That is it.

The ending almost left it open ending, so I also maybe got a laugh of it’s last minute decision to bring closure.

Basically, this movie has more in common with a shitty B movie straight horror movie trying to make money with sex and gore. They have some sex parts in it, and some gore, but not much of either. Definitely not with Dora Madison Burge. To see that, you’d have to watch season eight of Dexter. But then you’d have to watch season eight of Dexter. Not worth it, yo.

Puns. Puns are an often overlooked humor tool that are wildly taken for granted. In fact, some people respond to puns with groans!

Those groaners I have to imagine would not enjoy Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs 2 which has more puns than the number of acupuncturists who also happen to be backstabbers.

I wonder how many animated dicks could fit in his mouth. For research.

CWaCoM2 takes places immediately after CWaCoM, with the town of Swallow Falls in disarray and covered with food. Flint (Bill Hader) and his friends are excited for the rebuild, but they are forced to temporarily move to San Franjose, California, while Live Corp cleans up their island…for science! After all, Live Corp is run by Chester V (Matt Forte), Flint’s hero since he was a kid and the coolest scientist ever. It is usually a good idea to let trained professionals take care of a job.

Unfortunately, the clean up isn’t going as smoothly as they had hoped. The FLDSMDFR device was not destroyed after the first film, and it has created animal food hybrids to take over the island! They are also learning how to swim, and if they do, they will spread out and attack the rest of the world! Scary!

So it is up to Flint, with the rest of his crew to save the day. Sam Sparks (Anna Faris), girlfriend and meteorologist, Tim (James Caan), father, Brent McHale (Andy Samberg), former bully and current idiot, Manny (Benjamin Bratt), jack of all trades, Earl (Terry Crews), security guard, and Steve (Neil Patrick Harris) the monkey.

We also get introduced to Barb (Kristen Schaal), the ape. The fact that she is an ape, and not a monkey, is a very important difference.

Charles V reminded me a lot of Professor Hawk from Dexter’s Laboratory.

When I saw the trailer for CWaCoM2, I knew there would be an overwhelming amount of puns, but I still somehow underestimated how many they would actually throw at the viewer. At one point, the PPM (Puns Per Minute) value had to be greater than 10. Just constant puns, one after another, with hardly any time to comprehend them all.

Personally, I think the film was a bit too short to tell the story it wanted to tell. A lot of the movie felt rushed, especially once they first got to the island. In order to appease the kid viewers, they must have moved quickly to keep their interest. That has to be the biggest negative, not giving enough time to really flesh out the island and “foodimals.”

At the same time, I was equally impressed with the film’s ability to include “background jokes.” Once I saw the first few, my eyes were constantly watching the edge of the screen and I was surprised at how often they appeared. Heck, Joe Townee from the first film was snuck into this film twice. Unfortunately he had no lines this time, because his voice actor, Will Forte, was now voicing a new major character.

This film is filled with its fair share of low brow humor jokes, but an almost equal number of intelligent-ish jokes. I guess the point I am really trying to make is that this film has a lot of jokes, and they vary across the whole spectrum (outside of the adult themed joke territory). Despite the new writers and directors, I think it is a very worthy sequel to this franchise, and I would definitely watch a third one should it ever get made.

Don Jon is the first film written and directed by everyone’s favorite boyfaced actor. After having a few very strong years (Inception, 50/50, The Dark Knight Rises and Looper), Joseph Gordon-Levitt took a long break in order to work on this pet project of his.

Of course based on the character of Don Juan, JGL is hoping to add a very unique, and potentially controversial, spin to the tale.

JGL wrote this movie just to have movie sex with ScarJo a lot. Fact.

Jon (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is a charismatic twenty something Jersey Boy. Jon is nicknamed the Don by his friends (Jeremy Luke, Rob Brown) for his ability to bring a woman home every weekend. Not average woman either, but 8s, 9s, and even 10s. He only cares about a few things in life: his body, his pad, his ride, his family, his church, his boys, his girls, and his porn.

What? His porn? Yep, turns out Jon has a little addiction going on.

Why does he like porn so much if he can always get “the real thing” in person? Well, that seems to be the million dollar question in this film. Jon just finds the real thing a bit disappointing compared to what he can find quickly on the internet. It is as if the women in these films aren’t like women in the real world.

That is, until he meets Barbara (Scarlett Johansson), the woman of his dreams, a perfect 10. He is willing to change for her too. Take her on actual dates, stop the playboy lifestyle, start taking night classes, you name it. But can he give up porn? Is she the one? She definitely disapproves of the practice, because she grew up sheltered and doesn’t accept that “everyone does it!”

Jon’s family (Tony Danza, Glenne Headly, Brie Larson) are both very supportive and destructive in his life, but he still cares about them as well. He also meets Esther (Julianne Moore), a strange older woman in his night class who has sage advice and is way too nosy about what he watches on his phone.

Hold me closer, Tony Danza.

Watching “Don Jon,” I bet Joseph is tired of being associated with the movies and TV shows he did when he was younger. That is probably he chose to write and direct a movie with such an intense subject matter. In America, it is pretty easy for a woman child star to break away from those chains, and it happens pretty often (and each time it is met with outrage) but it is practically impossible for a guy. I think we found it, folks.

What I am most impressed with for this movie is its sense of realism, especially amongst his family. The dialogue and arguments he faced with his father (Tony Danza, excellent in this role) and mother were just so natural, I feel as if they’ve known each other for years. All of my favorite scenes came in their household.

I will admit, I did find the subject matter very awkward to watch with a bunch of strangers in a dark crowded theater. I understand why a few people left early on, with a lot of scenes taken directly from Pornhub. . Scarlett Johnsson, despite being in a role I hated, definitely acted in a way I have never seen her in before, which was both exciting and frightening at the same time.

“Don Jon” also had a pretty unique ending. Joseph took it in a way no one would expect from the trailers. Despite being unique, I couldn’t call it fantastic or terrible, just an overwhelming meh. It definitely could have been better.

Overall, I’d say “Don Jon” is worth watching for a few reasons: the topic itself can lead to interesting discussions amongst your friends and loved ones, the sound “advice” it eventually churns out, and the great acting amongst the leads. Besides, when is the last time you saw Tony Danza in anything relevant?

I can say with most certainty, that two months ago, I definitely had no urge to watch Stomp The Yard in my life. Ever. I forgot it existed, and my life was fine with that. But then two things happened.

1) One of my students said it was their favorite movie. Out of 48, only 5 students picked a movie that I hadn’t seen before, and that was one of them. Grrr… Kind of have to watch it now.

2) I saw Battle of the Year, made a joke about this movie, and realized I should hurry up and watch it.

I am not expecting really anything, some sort of college dance movie. Let’s do it. I mean, shit, I liked Drumline.

Hey, at least we have people doing flips. Like a cheerleading movie!

DJ (Columbus Short) and his brother Duron (Chris Brown) used to be street battlers. They had a crew who would battle other crews in clubs for cash. They also used to be alive.

After the battle at the beginning, they go cocky and accept a double or nothing offer. They win, pissing off the local crew even more, who want revenge. In the fisticuffs, Duron is stabbed and killed (Yes, Chris Brown dies). Well, that kind of puts a damper on things, so DJ quits the crew, moves out of LA and into Atlanta to live with his Aunt and Uncle (Harry Lennix, Valarie Pettiford), who got him into Truth University.

He gets a roommate, Rich Brown (Ne-Yo), and a new group of friends, but he doesn’t care about anyone. He just misses his brother.

Anyways, long story short, Truth University has two fraternities who are on top and great at stepping, both making it to the nationals every year. Unfortunately, one of them has won seven years in a row, and the other always comes up short. Guess who DJ ends up choosing? Well, after he is convinced that stepping isn’t just some pussy dance stuff.

He picks the underdogs, lead by Sylvester (Brian White), mostly because the girl he wants, April (Meagan Good), is dating Grant (Darrin Dewitt Henson), second in command of the other frat, and a total douche.

Then dance movie stuff happens, predictable plot turns like his past coming back to haunt him. You know. Normal stuff. Jermaine Williams is also in this movie, with a face that looks like I have seen him everywhere, but basically just in Fat Albert.

This movie is about step team dancing and colleges. Holy shit, why did no one tell me about this before?

I love watching step teams perform. Going to college in NC, I was actually able to see fraternities do this kind of stuff live. Probably not the high quality presented in this film, but it is still cool to see live. Honestly, only mainly black fraternities do this, so if you don’t live at a place with them, you won’t really know much about them. There are zero step teams in Iowa, for example. Just a guess.

As it is a dance movie, I must judge its dancing. Early on, when they were battling? That first part of the movie was horrible, a mess. The camera was all shaky, you couldn’t tell what was going on, just ugly. When they started stepping? Hell yeah. It got good then. But it could have been a lot better. The camera shouldn’t cut away as much, because part of it is watching the unison and everyone working together.

The plot was predictable, and some major drama moments just came up short. The overall story wasn’t too original. Pretty typical of a similar sports movie, about a kid getting off the streets. So there are no bonus points for the story. Only bonus points for the really fun dancing to watch and every once in awhile, a joke that actually made me laugh.