FOOTLOOSE
Directed by Craig Brewer
Screenplay by Dean Pitchford and Craig Brewer from the original story by Dean Pitchford
Rated M 113 minutes
Cinemas everywhere
LIKE Fame, Flashdance and Dirty Dancing, the original Footloose was made in the 1980s when dance movies were starting to absorb the influence of the aerobics class and the exercise video.
It was an era epitomised by the muscular charms of Patrick Swayze, whose lead role in Dirty Dancing turned him into the movie musical's sex god. Unlike John Travolta's Tony Manero, the dandy who commanded the disco floor in the 1970s in his white suit and stacked heels, Swayze preferred a tight t-shirt and made dance look like gymnastics with music.
Since then, nothing much has changed - except that the popularity of TV dance contests has added a layer of glitter and the bodies have grown even more buff. At least Swayze had a taste for romance. These days it's hard to tell if dancers are trying to seduce one another or just admiring their own pecs.
The original Footloose, directed by a veteran maker of musicals, Herbert Ross, preceded Dirty Dancing by three years but its hero, Ren McCormack, is another athletic type. Played in the original by Kevin Bacon with the aid of body doubles and a cunning editor, he is best remembered for his energy during the film's "angry scene", a dance routine in which he works off his frustrations by bouncing off the walls of a disused warehouse to the Moving Pictures' track Never.
Craig Brewer's new version reprises the sequence with a couple of variations. Its star, Kenny Wormald, dances to the White Stripes' Catch Hell Blues but the mood is just as furious.
While Brewer has added eight new songs to the film's score, he has been careful not to mess with what fans of the original regard as their own rock 'n' roll-style Rebel Without a Cause. As the music-loving teenager who finds himself having to live in a town where dancing in public is illegal, Wormald has thoughtfully adopted a James Dean quiff.
Ren has moved from Boston to live with his aunt and uncle in Georgia following the death of his mother, and his love of rock 'n' roll soon gets him into trouble. There has been a car accident in which five teenagers have died after a night of drinking and dancing and the authorities have imposed a curfew as well as the ban on rock 'n' roll. These draconian laws are initiated by Dennis Quaid, of all people, who looks thoroughly bewildered by his casting as the town's God-bothering preacher. Julianne Hough is playing his daughter, Ariel, and she reacts to the new rules by taking up with the town boor (Patrick John Flueger), who is bent on killing them both with his obsession with drag racing.
It is a strangely old-fashioned tale, neatly arranged around a predictable series of set-pieces lifted from the original and judiciously re-worked. Brewer, a Southerner, has said he was struck by the preponderance of white faces in Ross's film so his cast includes some African-Americans - although only in supporting roles. His most radical choice is the casting of Ziah Colon, who comes from a Puerto Rican family, as Ariel's best friend, Rusty (Sarah Jessica Parker in the original). There is, too, an unexpected bonus in lanky Miles Teller's engaging performance as Ren's pal, Willard, a role played originally by Chris Penn.
Otherwise, the changes are mainly musical. Hip-hop has been added to the mix, and Ren and Ariel break the curfew one night to visit an Atlanta club where the clientele put a lot effort into trying to make line dancing look cool.
Footloose is an anodyne example of Hollywood's fixation on remakes but it is slightly better than I expected. I endured Brewer's last musical, Hustle & Flow - a hip-hop movie that achieved the dubious distinction of scoring an Oscar with a song called It's Hard Out There for A Pimp.
