Seen: July 14, 2007
Format: DVD
Rating: 5
I have a problem with this film. I'm very fond of the underlying story. I reacted strongly to these kids during their journey. I like a lot of them, and generally respect the rest. I really rooted for them throughout the film, and their triumphs elated me.
But as a documentary, this film is a mess.
There's simply too much different going on here, and the films seems unfocused at times.
The fundamental idea is to follow these kids from three schools as they learn how to dance, and then on through a citywide competition. This does happen. But it doesn't seem to happen in equal measure. The screen time seems very heavily skewed to on particular school. As the film progresses, one school is eliminated from the competition and their story resolves reasonably well. Another seems to just disappear. A fourth school is followed briefly, but the coverage is spotty.
It seem as if the film makers covered their bases by following multiple schools until after the competition was over. Then they edited the film to focus on the school that had done the best in the competition. The school which was eliminated fairly early was given significant screen time as well, to juxtapose the more successful school.
All this seems a bit contrived to me. While a documentary should have a focus and theme, and rarely is truly objective, this feels highly subjective and a bit like cheating to me. It's almost as if the filmmakers had the actual film prematurely plotted in their head, and then chose the moments of reality to realize that plot.
One of the beauties of the documentary film form is it's unpredictability and how the film makers deal with unexpected change. American Movie is a great example of a documentary having to adapt to unforeseen circumstances. Mad Hot Ballroom seems contrived in comparison.
There are also several scenes which don't seem to fit the picture well. A brief scene of the competition organizers in a meeting seems superfluous. We don't care about them, we care about how he children will perform.
There are numerous scenes of the children discussing their views on life, love and their futures. While this is interesting, most of it has little to do with the focus of the film, dancing. This seems to be an attempt to inject a moral imperative into the film; that learning to dance will improve them in several ways and ultimately make them more successful. While I won't debate that this may be true, the majority of the scenes, while entertaining, are superfluous and fail to communicate this. Simple interview voice-overs from a teacher are used as well, and are simpler and much more effective.
Another disturbing facet of the film is the competitive nature of the adults in this film. Some are almost frightening in their zeal. It seems that there is significant though very localized cachet associated with doing well in this competition, and this brings out an ugly side to some of the adults. It's interesting to juxtapose the teacher of the most successful school to the one from the school which is eliminated early. Their attitudes are very different.
After all that criticism, I have to tell you that there are magical moments in this film. The ability of some of theses kids is great. There is a priceless moment where a judge reacts to one of the dancers. The kids are generally nice and dedicated to what they're doing. Despite the contrived nature of the film, there is a truly great story here.
My rating is purely based on what I consider to be the poor documentary nature of the film; I'm a bit stringent in that regard. Don't let it stop from enjoying these kids' journey.
The Good: The kids and their story
The Bad: Lack of direction
The Ugly: Competitive teachers
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