Oh, how sad. The Step Up franchise continued to wow audiences with flashy camerawork and dirty dancing, and the original dance movie, Center Stage, got demoted to television. Two years after Step Up made a splash, Center Stage made a sequel and pretty much copied their formula, focusing more on modern and street dancing than ballet. Sixteen years after the original, Center Stage: On Pointe was the third in the trilogy. Peter Gallagher, Ethan Stiefel, and Sascha Radetsky, were sixteen years older, and the latter two transitioned from principal dancers to teachers at the American Ballet Company. Die-hard fans like me will appreciate seeing the three from the original film, but it is a little sad to face the fact that we all get old, and dancers get old faster than the rest of us.
Since appreciation for classical ballet has dwindled in the past sixteen years, Peter, as company director, has agreed to expand the academy with a modern dance branch. Ethan, Sascha, and the star of the second Center Stage (and the remake of Footloose), Kenny Wormald, have "dance boot camp" in a fun cabin in the woods to recruit the best of the best to join the academy. You'll also see Kenny's costar from the earlier film, Rachele Brooke Smith, since it's her younger sister (See, we all get old), Nicole Munoz, who is the lead in this one.
While I'll watch any Center Stage film, my loyalty lies with the 2000 original. I love seeing classically trained ballet dancers, since their dedication to their craft starts practically as soon as they can walk, as they alter their bone structure while their bones are still soft and pliable. Modern dancers have to learn techniques and possess great muscular control, but they don't permanently alter their bodies for the chance of a few successful years of dancing before injury or "age" (at thirty) cuts their careers short. It's just not the same thing. Ballet is danced to classical compositions; modern dance is set to rap and hip hop, and frequently relies on sexuality to attract fans and viewers. I'd rather watch a ballet performance than an MTV video, even though the dancers in the latter have practiced and worked very hard.
