There’s over a dozen dance sequences in ABCD (Anybody Can Dance) and every single one of them is a cracker. The performers in this new Bollywood release leap, swing, bounce, jump, sway and swing with an energy and grace that’s just thrilling. The great fun of the picture is watching a bunch of talented dancers – all playing wannabe pros – dust things up.
the film never really stalls or feels flat
Set in Mumbai, a place portrayed here as dangerous and full of dark temptations and even cruelty, it’s not hard to work out the moral of the story. Still, late in the movie, the hero, a choreographer called Vishnu (Prabhu Deva), spells it out anyway. 'These kids are living a dream," he tells one worried and disapproving parent. For Vishnu and his dancers, this dream doesn’t have much to do with cultural and religious conservatism (even if the film’s well-earned smiles 'n’ tears climax provides an irreverent but heartfelt celebration of country, ritual and folk tradition).
The movie’s 'underdog’ yarn and overall mood of good times and high hopes produces a kind of optimistic high that is beguiling. The film is a fantasy but drugs, poverty and those hard-to-evade obligations of family and loyalty exist on the story’s sunny margins, only intruding to hot the action up.
ABCD actually seems to combine the plots of a number of showbiz/backstage standards. It uses the one about a talented impresario who needs a comeback; there’s the one about 'street-kids’ who sublimate their hunger for independence and social rebellion into art. And then there’s the major plot engine: the one about poor, unlikely talented amateurs who, against impossible odds, take on the privileged.
As the film opens, Vishnu is backstage at a TV dance show (a format that’s become a huge pop phenomenon in India). Vishnu is lead choreographer at the prestigious JDC dance company, operated and owned by his business partner Jahangir Khan (Kay Kay Menon). The JDC performance is terrible, but they win the contest anyway. Vishnu realises that Jahangir has 'bought’ the prize. Vishnu argues with his friend, who demotes him to a desk job. Vishnu quits. An old pal, Gopi (Ganesh Acharyaas), convinces Vishnu to start his own group. They convert a wrecked warehouse and recruit a bunch of kids from rival street gangs. The plan is to get back on the TV Dance show and win it. For Vishnu, the stakes are elemental: it’s a question of pride. For the dance kids, a victory in such a forum means a career kick-start.
Much of ABCD is, in terms of script, routine and 'seen before’. Early on, the drama devolves to such non-questions as: What will it take for the rival street gang leaders D (Dharmesh Yelande) and Rocky (Salman Yusuff Khan) to set aside their egos and get on with the show? What nasty tactics will Jahangar resort to in an effort to sabotage Vishnu’s dance team?
Still, loyalty and betrayal provide the film with some nice narrative beats; JDC’s star performer Riya shifts her allegiance to Vishnu after Jahangir feels her up while 'rehearsing’, which in the movie’s moral universe is further reason to hate the guy – not only is this creep a cheat, he’s also a perv and a sleaze. Riya is played by Lauren Gottlieb, who became a star performer after her appearance on So You Think You Can Dance, one of the models for the movie’s fictional TV dance contest show; it’s a neat bit of ironic gag casting intended, I reckon, to underscore the 'real’ possibility in the film’s 'Yes, I can make it in the big time’ plot.
Interestingly, by contrast to everyone else in the picture, Vishnu seems oddly sexless and a little remote, emotionally speaking; is he too much of an artist to be interested in a love life? His bland image is made over into something sexy and vibrant and virile though once on stage. (His major dance number, an amazing solo staged in a nightclub, is one of the film’s best moments.)
Helmed by Remo D'Souza, who is better known as a choreographer than as a director, the film never really stalls or feels flat. The one-on-one drama moments are no-nonsense affairs, the comic relief never gets embarrassing and D’Souza has a real gift for staging complex set-ups. He knows how to shoot the action to give each dance number a unique interest whether he’s using water, dust, fire or acrobatics as a visual lick.
He’s a classicist; D’Souza is smart enough to place the burden of the drama not in the dialogue scenes with his cast of in-expert actors but in the musical numbers (though Gottlieb struggles). These bits drive the action and develop the emotions and relationships. And in this directorial scheme, the movie’s routine plotting actually becomes a virtue; like the kids, the movie comes off as innocent, sweet and completely in love with dance.
