Paramount Pictures, Spyglass Entertainment, Dylan Sellers Productions,

Kenny Wormald, Julianne Hough, Dennis Quaid, Ziah Colon, Ray McKinnon, Miles Teller, Ser’Darius William Blain, Patrick Flueger, Andie MacDowell, Maggie Jones

Young rebel (?) Ren MacCormack (Kenny Wormald) comes into a small town run with an iron fist by the town elders led by conservative preacher Rev. Shaw Moore (Dennis Quaid). Rev Shaw’s Daughter, Ariel (Julianne Hough) is a sexy blonde on the edge of her sexuality and attracted to bad boy Ren from the start much to her father’s dismay. The town has outlawed dancing as it leads kids into trouble, but Ren makes it his goal to win Ariel, change her father’s mind, and hold a dance for the poor underprivileged youth of the town.

This remake of of the 1984 version with Kevin Bacon and Lori Singer as the teens, and John Lithgow as the uptight preacher is another remake that didn’t need to be made. I never thought the original was such a wonderful film, but it wasn’t too bad, and somehow it really resonated with a lot of the children of the 80’s. I didn’t think the original was nearly as good as Dirty Dancing was, even though there were some similarities. But this remake just didn’t need to be made.

The down sides are that they twisted and turned the story on it’s side, to try to make it hip for 2011. But they lost a lot of the drama and redeeming qualities of the original trying to make it today!!! Secondly the soundtrack was rather weird too. The mix of songs in the soundtrack seemed like they were trying to find something for everyone from Slim Whitman to Fifty Cent. It didn’t cut it. Julianne Hough has finished her run as a dancing instructor on DWTS, and is ready to move on to acting, and she’s as cute as a button, and maybe someday will turn out to be a decent actress, but she’s not ready yet, especially for this role. But she’s cute. Dennis Quaid did a decent job as the preacher man, but they watered down his role to make it more relevant to the hip hop fans I guess they thought would flock to this film. They didn’t. Trying to compete with John Lithgow’s performance is a tough challenge.

So I have an idea for them to try in the future. Remember how in the “old days” Walt Disney used to re-release his movies every 7 years, because he thought that every 7 years a new generation of kids came along that had never seen the film? Well that doesn’t work so well today, because of DVD’s and Cable TV, and instant downloads, but, when the meeting starts up about “Let’s do a remake of Footloose, because a lot of people loved it in the 80’s. But if you remake it, you have to pay the crew, and all the actors, and everyone, so simply release the original to the theaters. (Maybe you can spend a few bucks to spruce it up and convert it to digital and all that). Then those that never saw it, can go to the theater and enjoy it again. But I think the only ones who loved this remake version were those involved in making the dang thing. What a disappointment that never needed to be done. What a waste.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

 

 

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