Director: Herbert Ross

By Carey

A small town that bans public dancing for teenagers?  Really?  That will fly in 2011/12?  I’m not sure about that.  But who is going to go into a film like Footloose and really contemplating the nuances (are there even any?) of it.  It is a superficial film that just wants you to have a good time watching it.  Accept it for what it is.

A group of teens are doing what people their age do best – partying and drinking.  After winning a football game the students of Bomont High celebrate with a party filled with dancing, loud music and drinking.  Five students, after partaking in all the party had to offer, get in a car and drive off.  A tragic car accident ensues and the five are killed.  Community leader and grieving father Reverend Shaw Moore (Dennis Quaid – The Day After Tomorrow, In Good Company) has lost his only son, Bobby (Blair Jasin), in the accident and he fights for and gets ratified a city law that disallows any public dancing or loud music.

Three years later, big-city teen Ren MacCormack (Kenny Wormald – Center Stage: Turn It Up, Clerks II) moves from Boston to small town Bomont, Georgia to live with his Uncle Wes (Ray McKinnon – The Blind Side, The Net) after his mother dies.  It is some adjustment for him to make.  At school he is the outsider.

After an initial confrontation he makes a friend in a classmate named Willard (Miles Teller – Project X, Rabbit Hole) and his eye is caught by the beautiful but rebellious Ariel (Julianne Hough – Burlesque).  As it turns out, Ariel is the daughter of Reverend Moore.  But she is the furthest thing from a preacher’s daughter that you would imagine.  She continuously breaks the rules, sneaks around and is even dating a stock car driver (Patrick John Flueger – Brothers, The World’s Fastest Indian) who she knows her parents would disapprove of.

Ren finds out that there not only is he not allowed to play loud music while driving his car (he’s already been pulled over once) that there is no prom at Bomont High.  Though it seems like a trivial thing, he is not about to accept this and decides to go up against Reverend Moore and the rest of city council in order to get this law reversed.

Anyone of a certain age has seen the mid 80s original of this film starring Kevin Bacon.  It was beloved and the soundtrack was a big hit.  To want to remake it and have people like it is a big undertaking.  While there certainly is nostalgia attached to the original Footloose, it certainly wasn’t a cinematic classic.  It was just a fun time and we should not hold the remake up to higher standards than that.

That being said, while the original is certainly better the remake is a decent film on certain levels.  Julianne Hough and Kenny Wormald are great dancers and certainly do well in that aspect of the film.  And I have to admit I did not hold out great hope for Hough’s acting and was pleasantly surprised.  She wasn’t horrible.  Fun and great choreography is what 2011’s Footloose has going for it, but director Craig Brewer’s (Black Snake Moan, Hustle & Flow) film does have its weak points.

First of all, the soundtrack, which was a winner with the original, is terrible.  A film of this sort relies heavily on the music to set the tone for it and in this case the tunes are a big failure.  Without that solid base much of the film has a kind of lifeless or dull feel to it.  Next up is some of the acting, while the younger actors do generally well it is the vets like Dennis Quaid and Andie McDowell who are terrible.  McDowell looks like she does not want to be there and just monotonously recites her lines while Quaid is doing what seems to be a seminar in overacting.

Special Features:

  • Commentary by Craig Zadan and Dean Pitchford
  • Commentary by Kevin Bacon     
  • Let’s Dance! Kevin Bacon on Footloose
  • From Bomont to the Big Apple: An Interview with Sarah Jessica Parker
  • Remembering Willard
  • Kevin Bacon’s Screen Test
  • Kevin Bacon Costume Montage
  • Footloose: A Modern Musical – Part 1
  • Footloose: A Modern Musical – Part 2
  • Footloose: Songs That Tell A Story
  • Theatrical Trailer