By Kadeem Lundy
The infamous Wayans Brothers are back in their new comedy
Dance Flick. Dance Flick, a spoof of dance films like
Save The Last Dance, Stomp the Yard, You Got Served and
Step Up, stars Damon Wayans Jr.. The new generation Wayans plays Thomas Uncles, a young man from the inner city, who connects with a woman named Megan White played by Shoshana Bush. The pair is brought together by their love of dancing. In the mix the Wayans incorporate send offs of films such as
Twilight into the film.
From the start it's easy to tell that the characters of Thomas and Megan are based on Sean Patrick Thomas and Julia Stiles characters in
Save The Last Dance and the plot is basically a hijacked storyline from
Save The Last Dance and
You Got Served. However in typical Wayans fashion the jokes and gimmicks are over the top, often times resulting in serious injury or death of a character in the film.
What is different this time around is that the elder Wayans (think Marlon, Shawn and Keenan) step back and let the younger Wayans (Craig, Damien Dante, and Damon Jr.) take over the direction of the film in which the younger do an impressive job of carrying the film. So, we get to see Shawn Wayans’ comical role as a deadbeat dad, and Marlon as an overly dramatic acting teacher.
Even though the jokes and gimmicks are expected at times, the energy, timing of delivery of gags keeps the film going along with the dance numbers. The Wayans teeter on the brink of an R rated film, but managed to keep the film PG-13 to legitimately sell to the teen audience.
Dance Flick is a good comedy even though the film moves at an abnormally rapid rate. The material is typical of Wayans fare of the
Scary Movie like and viewers will find some gimmicks and jokes as mere variations of those gimmicks. The Wayans are sure to have another hit on their hands, and after this film, we can expect much more from the younger generation of the First Family of Comedy.