The recent news of Magic Mike 2 happening got me thinking about all my favorite dance movies and how I’m totally a sucker for them. Most of the time, the acting is horrendous, the dancing may be questionable by the leads, but the magic combination of a person with a bad turn out/heart of gold gets me every time. Yup, you can totally blame me for all the boy from the other side of the tracks suddenly becoming a lyrical phenomenon. I eat it right up. Girl makes it to the big city only to find out her technique is sub-par but man does she light up a stage? That’s a window to my soul. Kids from difference racial backgrounds find common ground in music? That’s our ticket to world peace. I totally take responsibility for the existence of these movies and even TV shows and wish there were so many more.
Here are some of my favorites. They are fantastic and you can not convince me otherwise.
Center Stage
Girl from a small town auditions for the prestigious ABC ballet school that feeds into the world-renowned company. Girl quickly realizes that she has bad feet and bad technique, but man does she light up the stage. Throw in a brief affair with the company’s best dancer, the struggles of the dance world, eating disorders, and ear worm music from Mandy Moore (did I mention this movie came out circa 2000?) and this movie easily makes my top 5 list. The movie has one of the best ending dance sequences of modern dance flicks, hands down.
Dance Academy
Dance Academy is a mash up of different dance flick genres all together in an Australian dance teen tv show. It’s Center Stage meets Step Up in 23 minute segments. The show mostly follows Tara who is from the outback (guess that’s like farm country) and has big dreams of being a professional dancer. Too bad her back woods technique isn’t good enough, but like her Center Stage counterparts, there’s just something about the way she dances. The real pull of the TV show is the YA nature of the stories. First crushes, first kisses, letters that get emailed to the entire school by mistake…it’s all the bad stuff that makes it so good. If you are intrigued, full seasons can be found on Netflix.
Save the Last Dance
JULIA STILES. SEAN PATRICK THOMAS. Oh the memories of this time period. Interracial coupling and mixing dance genres. This movie is pure early 2000s dance gold. Julliard likes nothing better than ballet auditions with a little street beatz.
Decided it would be best to have a completely separate post to address the dance flicks of the 80s because BOY were those epically BAD (I mean GOOD).
What are some of your favorite dance movies of the past two decades?
