Feel the Beat

This is defintly Sofia Carson at her best. Her character in this movie is so unlikable and mean, borderline the villain in fact, which is a nice change from the teeny bopper DIsney Channel characters she usually plays. I would actually like to see a movie where she is 100% villain. I know she was Sandman's daughter in that Spider-Man episode, but I want a full movie where she's like a full psycho evil classic villain.

Ok, so plot-wise, this is pretty much beat for beat (no pun intended) School of Rock, but with dance instead of rock band, but not nearly as funny. It's predictable, yes, but still enjoyable. it feels very 90s in some parts, but I think that was kind of the point. The young kids in this film also give very believable performances. I thought this was a fun movie. Netflix lied about the rating, though. They have it listed as TV-G, but it is definitely a PG-13. Mild language, some suggestive content, some...teenage situations, let's say. It's about the same level as School of Rock (which is also PG-13) in terms of content. I hope Sofia gets more roles that show her range. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, cast her as a villain. (Evie from Descendants doesn't count. She wasn't actually a villain, she was just vain.) Grade: B 8/10 4/5 stars

Feel the Beat (3 out of 5 stars).

Feel the Beat is a cute fair family film. When big shot dancer April (Sofia Carlson) blows an audition that turns bad. She moves back home to a small town where she tries to teach and coach a bunch of young girls dancers. Soon enough, they make go on a competition tour.

The plot is cute and charming. It can be predictable with its story. April lost the big leagues in dancing. And teaches a group of girls that has yet to compete. The girls and April do not easily get along. When the girls are looking up to her. But April is critical. She also runs into her former boyfriend which she ran out on cause she wanted to move to the city. And he stayed in there home town.

The direction and script is cheesy. With cheesy dialgoue. Can be cringing with its direction. But it tries to have a lot of fun.

Sofia Carlson is good with the role. She is fun. Charming. And beautiful.

I expected this to be goofy and probably subpar but at least entertaining. It actually ended up being much better than I expected with fun storylines that kept me enthralled.

As a movie, it was splendidly fun and often took itself seriously one moment only to play around the next, keeping the pace and story alive and fun the whole way through. Sofia Carson also got to flex her intense skill in dance after years in The Descendants while also giving some serious proof that she's a great actress.

This is absolutely worth the watch.

Is this a bad movie? No I don't think so. Would I ever want to watch it again? Same answer.

It is really really family friendly stuff. Like the whole family can sit down on a Sunday night and watch this. Or like you can stick it on to keep the kids happy during Quarantine or the summer holidays.

Did I find anything in this movie remotely funny? No but I'm not a 9 year old so maybe they would. I sometimes struggle to tell if a younger audience would find stuff funny. When I was a kid would I have found this movie funny, no probably not.

So it's easy watching and like "feel good" I guess. So you could stick it on your children and maybe watch it with them unless you have something better to do.

Follows a typical formula: snotty princess goes down to her roots, discovers meaning through helping others, and finds love by foregoing the fast track to success.

In this case though the snotty princess is legitimately talented, focused and career driven, strict but realistic. She makes a compelling and original lead.

The "finding meaning through helping others" part is fairly predictable but also well developed with likeable supporting cast and charismatic and talented child actors as her dance class students.

The "finding love" part is very predictable, but there is chemistry between the leads, and they play off each other well. The backstory with the breakup by text is funny.

Many of the subplots are also well developed and the side characters are funny too. I like that the whole town supports the dance class and the dads learn the dance routines with the kids.

Overall a familiar plot with a very good cast and some surprising moments of insight, humor, as well as wry humor and realism about success in the talent industry.

I enjoyed this family film a lot. The running time is close to two hours but it goes by fast. The movie has many dance scenes but they could be more fully fledged.