Aiming to be this year’s Fame/Footloose hybrid, Step Up throws a tough street dancer into community service at Baltimore’s premiere performing arts school, where a pretty posh girl awaits in dire need of a new dancing partner (and a boyfriend, by the looks of her selfish, arrogant beau).
It’s predictable to the very last, and hampered by stiff expositionary dialogue and one-dimensional characters. Even so, there’s something charming about its enthusiasm, and the formula of the uplifting-dance-romance genre is adhered to well enough to attract young female viewers less familiar with its well-worn clichés. Buff, likeable lead Channing Tatum shouldn’t hurt either, but the rest of the young cast might want to go back to drama class - or stick to their admittedly sensational dancing.
