Newsfeed
Printer-Friendly ModeBanderas shows off dance moves in heartwarming film
April 17, 2006 —
What a pleasant surprise this is. Take the Lead is a heartwarming film that takes a formulaic approach and makes it work, consistently, from start to finish. What sets Take the Lead apart from other films of this kind is the feeling of honesty that it radiates, as well as the classy performance by Antonio Banderas.
Inspired by a true story or not, some of the events seem too convenient to be true. Despite this, I suspect most members of the audience will likely leave the theater with the same feeling of warmth I did.
Banderas plays Pierre Dulaine, a dance instructor in New York City. After witnessing the destruction of a high school principal's car, he decides to go to the school the next day with an offer. He is willing to take over a detention room that will be occupied by the same students for the rest of the year and teach them ballroom dancing.
After some thought, the principal, played by Alfre Woodard, who parades the halls admonishing students perpetually, accepts. Her reasons are not that she feels the program will help students, but because the students in her school will so despise the idea of learning ballroom dancing that they will stay out of trouble in order to avoid it. Of course, though, Dulaine will have some success, or else we wouldn't have a movie.
The detention class is made up of a mixture of kids who one would expect to see in this kind of trouble, and those who cause questions as to what accident happened to get a generally nice and good-hearted student in such a fix.
Even this early in the film, we begin to see why Banderas is perfect for this role. He doesn't just have the graceful dancing abilities to play a ballroom dance instructor; he has so much charm that it's almost a wonder the kids don't warm up to him sooner. As the movie progresses and the relationship between teacher and student, as well as student to student, deepens and becomes more complex, the realization comes that this movie is not enjoyable because of the framework of the plot, but because of the honest portrayal of empathy and gradual understanding that unfolds.
While there are too many students in the class for me to recall all of them by name, they certainly all have their personality quirks, and all are likable in their own way.
Many of them are stock characters, such as the self-conscious overweight boy, but what Take the Lead does with these stock characters is effective. It allows them to grow and come to understandings with each other about their differences as the film progresses, and does so in a sensible way, so that it is for the most part believable and doesn't feel hackneyed. While I had my own qualms at first about how learning ballroom dance could be a helpful thing for all of these students, as the plot progresses it begins to seem not so impossible, especially after Banderas demonstrates and explains the reason it is such a positive experience at a meeting intended to shut down his class.
Is Take the Lead too positive for its own good? I really don't think so. It borders on feeling too good to be true at times, certainly.
But it is such extraordinary events that make movies much of the time and that isn't always a bad thing. And, of course, there is always the "inspired by true events" tagline looming in the background, which often means little, though what Dulaine's dance classes have grown into in real life is very impressive.
Perhaps students couldn't take a few months of dance class and honestly compete with people who have been doing so for years, but is it too much to believe that they could find good in themselves and each other in the process of the lessons? Let's hope not.