Battle of the Year puts B-Boys back in the spotlight

Dance was absent from movie screens this summer when there was no new Step Up film to dazzle our senses. But fall brings a new dance movie, and a potential new series, with Battle of the Year, the story of a worldwide B-Boy dance competition that the Americans have yet to crack.

In Battle of the Year, hip hop mogul and former B-Boy Dante Graham (Laz Alonso) needs a new trainer for his crew. He enlists the aid of an old friend, and also former B-Boy, Jason Blake (Josh Holloway). Blake has been down on his luck since his wife and son died in a tragic car accident, but Dante knows that Blake’s experience coaching basketball is just what his crew needs to get them in shape for the competition.

But Blake sees nothing in Dante’s crew so he puts one together with the help of one of Dante’s employees Franklyn (Josh Peck) … except his new crew doesn’t understand the concept of “there’s no I in team” and things don’t go well at first, from bad feelings over a girl (who isn’t in either guy’s life anymore) to a case of homophobia. Blake has to wage his own battles with the crew to get them to form a team.

The Step Up series has certainly been uneven, but the dancing has always been spectacular (as has the 3D in the last two movies). Battle of the Year wants to be better than the worst of the Step Up movies, but it mostly comes off as a TV movie of the week. The B-Boys, at least the ones who are featured, are all stereotypes: the rivals, the one with the secret family, the gay one, the Jewish one, the Korean one … yes, this is a rainbow coalition of characters! But all of the guys do what they can with what they’ve been given to work with. They play the rivals perfectly, and you really do believe they’ve all grown to accept and trust each other by the end.

The two Joshes, Holloway and Peck, also give admirable performances. Holloway makes Blake’s sadness feel real, and even as you’re sitting there thinking “I can’t believe Sawyer is coaching a group of dancers,” you really do believe that he knows what he’s talking about. Peck’s Franklyn is Blake’s voice of reason when things go wrong, his idolizer as he sees what Blake is capable of doing, and his protector when Dante isn’t happy with the way Blake is training his guys. The two work well off of each other.

I know the big draw for many will be the appearance of Chris Brown as Rooster, the star dancer, and I will say that he does give a very natural performance that never seems like acting. But it just made my skin crawl to hear half the women in the audience squeal with delight the first time he comes on screen. That’s just all kinds of wrong.

Of course, the highlight of the movie is the dancing … but there isn’t a much as there could be. There are a lot of small moments here and there as the crew, dubbed The Dream Team, practice their moves, but we never get to see any full blown routines until they get to the Battle of the Year (which, by the way, is a real competition). Once the dancing starts, you can’t take your eyes off the screen, marveling at the sometimes inhuman moves these guys can make, not only the Dream Team, but some of the others from around the world as well. The 3D is also used very well at this point as hands and feet come flying off the screen and in your face.

The only major issue I have with the film is all the Sony product placement. Yes, the film was produced by Sony’s Screen Gems division but the way the crew slobbers over all of their Sony-branded goodies in their gift bags was just a bit much (the Braun shaver is also heavily featured). Other than that, I actually enjoyed the movie based on the performances of Holloway and Peck, and for the spectacular dancing and use of 3D. It may not be the best dance movie ever made, but it’s not the worst either. The clichés that pile up in the first half of the film are easily forgotten by the end … and that’s a good thing because if things go well, you can be sure there will be a follow-up.