Center Stage 2: Turn It Up

Turn it off would be a better title. I'll admit it, the first Center Stage film is one of my guilty pleasures. Anytime I see that it's on I have to watch it, I was hoping the sequel would have some of that so bad it's good magic.

The movie centers around Kate Parker a plucky dancer who wants to join the American Academy of Ballet. She doesn't make it in but luckily finds a job at a trendy nightclub to make ends meet. She falls for former hockey player turned ballet dancer, Tommy. Will Kate ever become the prima ballerina she wants to be? Will Tommy choose fame and fortune over true love? Anybody who's ever suffered through a bad dance movie knows the answers to these questions.

Worse yet, you don't hear about what happened to Jody, Eva, Maureen etc etc from the first film. Cooper returns as does Jonathan but they seem to be playing different characters. Jonathan is no longer the stern perfectionist that we loved to hate. In fact, the movie ends with his lips firmly latched on to Kate's firmly toned rear.

Cooper is no longer the suave superstud he was. He is more like that guy who graduated ten years ago but still attends all the high school parties. They mention that his company lost it's funding and don't even touch on what happened to Jody. I mean this is the character that turned her back on the Academy in order to join Cooper's company. She deserved at least a mention if nothing else.

Kate is simply irritating. She is supposed to be a determined self-taught dancer but falls apart every time something goes wrong. She allegedly taught herself to dance because her father refused to pay for ballet classes. But she tools around in a very snazzy car and carries an expensive cell phone around. At one point, she is supposedly sleeping on the streets but manages to look perfectly coiffed at all times.

The only redeeming feature of this film was using The DNC's Swing Baby Swing. I fell in love with that song at first listen and have been listening to it non-stop since.

Next up on the chopping block: Love's Deadly Triangle: The Texas Cadet Murder. A tawdry little tale about sex and murder starring Full House's Viper and Charmed's Piper.