Movie Review

Mad Hot Ballroom

This is a documentary about grade-schoolers who learn how to ballroom dance in their modest New York City location, heading towards a competition. That's it, really. There's not much else here even though the film festival hype purports that it gets into various important topics. Now, there are a few good things about this doc: the children are cute, funny, and very intelligent.

Older people may enjoy this film the most just because they find the energy of the kids infectious. The dancing, especially by the ballroom teachers association at their meeting, is very good and will make some people want to gyrate in their seats. And a lot of the music is rhythmic and colorful, providing the template for the whole endeavor. The film also portrays a positive side of life and really shows kids getting along and working together. However, these things do not come close to holding this documentary together.

The film reminded me of being back in grade school, especially the awkward parts that often came in the form of teacher's assignments. The liberalization of education has provided many awkward projects for students across the country, assuring that the anxious/shy kids receive their due embarrassment. Is the program in this film really going to change these kids' lives that much? Yes, they do learn to make eye contact and respect their partners, but shouldn't they learn that in regular school? A few years after this film, any of these kids could be doing any number of things and not all of them good. The whole program is incredibly overblown for the sake of this film.

There are a million competitions going on all the time that involve skillful children, ranging from spelling bees to skateboarding; and many of these children are from modest or outright poor backgrounds. This documentary tries to position the lightweight act of ballroom dancing as some kind of revolution in helping kids escape the "hood," and I'm not buyin' it.

This documentary also has a very weak cinematic sensibility. Probably 70% of the shots are of grade-schoolers just ballroom dancing, and it's just practice to boot. None of the characters are developed or even delved into at all; teachers just appear on the screen and start talking as if we're supposed to be interested in them because they're there (kind of like real school).

Interviews with the kids are short and spliced randomly throughout the movie, and faces and names pop in and out, leaving zero impact. There is nothing here to hook us in or to make us care. The filmmakers seem to think that the subject matter and people involved with it will somehow coast this project along on their own merit - but sadly, that's not the case.

Scott's Grade: C

A	15.1%
B	59.2%
C	24.5%
D	1.2%
F	0.0%