The hips that made Alba famous...and abs. She's the well-dressed, midriff-showing "hood rat" with a bleeding heart for the street kids who she knows will turn out to be "bad" if they don't turn to hip hop. Hip hop is hero in this "making of" film. She's a Jenny from the Block who frequents a club, gets spotted by a music video director, and immediately starts choreographing major music videos for famous artists. Professional (but mildly pornographic) dance routines - shout out to the obvious actual choreographer who just happens to be in every scene. Pretty sure he's the only one who can kick behind his head while stretching out and spread-eagle toe touch in the kids dance benefit finale at the end. Alba plays the angel to Bronx-talking, demon, pimp, music video director "Michael" who is none other than "David" from Newsies. He also may or may not have aged at all in the 20 years since he played a young Tom Hanks in Big. He tries to pull off a swear word here and there, but can't quite make it believable. Sure, he looks like a slimeball, but under it all we know he's still about to burst into the song "Seize the Day." You can take the boy out of the Newsies...
Disconnect: Alba's mother runs the "center" for kids in the bad part of town so they'll have a place to be and won't start selling drugs. She always looks down on her daughter for spending her time helping kids instead of making something of herself as a ballerina. Hmm. Unfortunately, the center becomes a hub for drug dealers to teach young kids their insidious ways. Later the center gets shut down because of disrepair. Alba's dream is to finally open a dance studio for kids in the bad part of town so they'll have a place to dance instead of selling drugs. Take that, Mom!
Three Part Rating System:
Audience...older Siblings
Ambiance..."kick, stretch, and kick!"...and laugh. Laugh a lot. Then try the moves over Christmas desserts to make your grandparents laugh so hard.
Attitude...Curious - flipping channels & you are just so curious, so you sit through most of it, only flipping intermittently to Monk re-runs because you just have to figure out how the guy from ER got his start in this movie.
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