cinemattraction

There are two good things about this film: the first scene and the last scene. The rest amounts to a poorly-executed attempt to weave these two incredibly dynamic dance sequences into an engaging but totally unnecessary narrative. It feels a bit like watching MTV solely for music videos: satisfying only when one pops up every now and then out of the rest of the musically irrelevant programming. As impressive as those moments are, struggling through the tedium to get to them probably isn’t worth it.

For a film that purports to be about an unusual but important style of dance – the African-tradition-inspired rhythm dancing known as “stepping” – relatively little of it happens. DJ Williams (Columbus Short) is a street dancer from Los Angeles who relocates to Georgia after losing his brother to a gunfight initiated by a dance-rivalry gone bad. Upon enrolling at Truth University, he finds himself observing another rivalry between two fraternities competing for the highly-revered national title in the annual step-dancing competition. Full of disdain for this unfamiliar, formulaic, group-oriented mode of performance, DJ instead dedicates his time to pursuing April (Meagan Good), the girl who caught his eye before he even registered for classes.

Thus begins the uninspired story of this film, which continues to develop as predictably as possible, incorporating the obligatory love triangle to accompany DJ’s shift from defiantly autonomous street kid to compassionate and committed fraternity brother and step dancer. Every minute of this film follows the formula laid out by other, similar dance-related movies, from Save the Last Dance to You Got Served to last summer’s Step Up. Formulaic is fine, but each of these films delivered up the final recipe with a freshness and a flair that Stomp the Yard seriously lacks.

Hence, the major problem with this film: too little dancing and too much story. Apparently, screenwriters Gregory Ramon Anderson and Robert Adetuyi assumed that audiences would fail to care about stepping as a compelling force in its own right and so decided to saturate their tale of a fascinating form of physical expression with a soggy story about DJ. Well, guys, it doesn’t work: DJ’s downer baggage actually detracts from my desire to know more about stepping – and from your opportunity to explore this unique cultural phenomenon to its fullest filmic potential.

Overshooting the mark doesn’t stop with the writers. Practically everyone involved in the making of this film seems to have been trying way too hard with something that should have been lighter and more fun. Director Sylvain White (I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer, Trois 3: The Escort, Quiet) never quite makes up his mind about the style of this film, generating a product that feels like a music video and an epic drama for equal amounts of time – whenever it’s not busy mimicking the style of made-for-TV after-school specials. Editor David Checel could easily be in the running for making the most cuts in one film and would probably come out on top for poorest timing in editing rhythmic sequences. And the script’s dialogue itself is cheesy enough, but when delivered with these performers’ utmost severity becomes unbearably ridiculous. Short, Good and the rest of the cast clearly never learned that subtlety is actually acceptable in film.

The two main dance sequences, in the beginning and at the end, are absolutely gripping, but on the whole Stomp the Yard is about as successful as a film as Fergie is at being a serious musical artist. I recommend checking out stepping, but do it elsewhere. Or wait for the DVD and fast forward from the first five minutes to the last. And repeat.

© 2007 Lydia Storie. All rights reserved.

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