Step Up 4: Miami Heat DVD Review

Romeo and Juliet meets Britain’s Got Talent in the fourth instalment of the Step Up franchise, released variously as Step Up: Revolution and Step Up 4 Ever.

She (Kathryn McCormich) is the well-to-do daughter of a greedy business tycoon, she’s gifted, with a ion for traditional dance and a desire to turn pro. Sadly she’s struggling to catch the attention of a prestigious dance school, they’re unimpressed with her routine, and tell her she needs to be edgier.

He (Ryan Guzman) is a rough diamond from the wrong side of the tracks and the lead in a gritty street dance crew called The Mob.

The Mob has become a viral internet sensation due to their penchant for impromptu public performances, but their neighbourhood – and by extension their troupe- is under threat from a grasping property developer.

Their eyes meet across a crowded beachside bar and lo! Fate has seen fit to bring together our impossibly sexy pair of star-crossed, well-dressed lovers, in an orgy of toned abs, impeccable tans and wrong-way-round baseball caps.

There are no prizes for guessing how Step Up 4 pans out. Nothing, not even the tiniest, most meagre treat can be justifiably awarded to anyone with even the slightest inkling of where the plot is headed. It’s that generic. The narrative – such as it is – is little more than a brittle mortar deployed in order to paste together the sizeable chunks of action.

The dance routines are frequent and frequently breathtaking, and it’s in these moments that the cast really gets to show their chops. Routines take place in all sorts of places: up-market art galleries, traffic jams or a la carte restaurants. They’re executed with panache and an originality that will hit a nerve with street dance devotees and should just about keep those less energetic viewers nodding their heads.

It’s a shame the foot-stomping isn’t complimented by anything approaching an interesting plot. A confused, money-grabbing ending points more to a lacklustre script than a real sense of two-faced hypocrisy, but it’s symptomatic of the film’s most obvious flaw.