A decent, well-put-together romantic drama to hold hands to on the weekend.
Save the Last Dance (2001)
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Reviews Counted:96
Fresh:51
Rotten:45
Average Rating:5.5/10
Consensus: This teen romance flick feels like a predictable rehashing of other movies.
Rated: PG-13 [See Full Rating] for violence, sexual content, language and brief drug references
Runtime: 1 hr 53 mins
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:Jan 12, 2001 Wide
Box Office: $90,696,166
Synopsis:
Sara's life is devoted to dance -- she wants nothing more than to make it into New York's famous Julliard School. But when tragedy strikes and she loses her mom, her hopes are dashed and she buries...
Sara's life is devoted to dance -- she wants nothing more than to make it into New York's famous Julliard School. But when tragedy strikes and she loses her mom, her hopes are dashed and she buries her dreams of ever attending the country's best dance school.
Without her Mom to support her, Sara moves to the tough streets of Chicago's South side to live with her Dad -- a down on his luck jazz musician who she barely knows. Her new school's a totally different world from the small town she grew up in, but Sara's quick comebacks and sassy attitude earn her the quick respect and friendship of straight-talking Chenille. But it's Chenille's brother, Derek, the cool and good-looking star of the school, who grabs Sara's attention. He plays it up tough, but he also has the smarts and a plan to go to medical school.
When Chenille takes Sara to Steppes, the neighborhood hang, she gets her first taste of hip-hop -- and Derek's the one to show her the moves. When they discover they share a passion for dance, they discover that there's something deeper going on -- a passion for each other. But they soon find out the hard way that they must not only overcome their own differences, but the resentment and bad blood of their friends and family. As the school year goes on, the couple finds that their affection and devotion to each other could ultimately threaten Derek's hopes for a better life and Sara's rediscovery of her dance.
Yet against all the odds they overcome the obstacles to their dreams, and discover that ultimately the only person you have to be is...yourself.
Starring: Julia Stiles, Sean Patrick Thomas, Terry Kinney, Fredro Starr
Starring: Julia Stiles, Sean Patrick Thomas, Terry Kinney, Fredro Starr, Kerry Washington, Bianca Lawson
Director: Thomas Carter
Director: Thomas Carter
Producer: Robert W. Cort, David Madden
Screenwriter: Duane Adler, Cheryl Edwards
Composer: Mark Isham
Studio: Paramount Pictures
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Reviews for Save the Last Dance
This movie would sooner see Derrick help Sara fulfill her Juilliard destiny than acknowledge how hard he worked to get into G-Town. It's profoundly square screen writing.
This skin-deep MTV Films production is more about promoting soundtrack sales than social causes.
The playing of ballet against hip-hop gets more than a little corny, but the charismatic young performers make the corn work.
For all its dumb clichés it offers the basic appeal of teen movies: the pleasure of watching kids be kids, acting as they do among themselves instead of how parents and teachers expect them to act.
The setup promises cliches, but the development is intelligent, the characters are more complicated than we expect, and the ending doesn't tie everything up in a predictable way.
A spirited, dirty dance between the polished inauthenticity of Hollywood romance-musicals and hip-hop's central tenet: keeping it real.
It's far from tepid teen fare, thanks largely to the sweet chemistry between up-and-comer Sean Patrick Thomas and leading lady Julia Stiles.
A Teen Dance Movie you don't have to remove your brain or be obsessed with getting-down to actually like.
The film has a lot of surface complication but no attention span; it's a centimeter deep.
The movie is flabby and fails to pack a punch, lacking the high-energy numbers needed to boost the tempo and get toes tapping.
A teen romance that generates enough honest emotion to play against the predictability of its finish.
As a film, it's no great shakes, and except for the reverse racism subplot, it's been there done that.
While the resulting romance between Sara and Derek plays out unremarkably, the surrounding social milieu is treated with unusual restraint and good sense.
More interesting as a barometer of suburban girls' fantasies than it is as a movie.
Breaks virtually no new narrative ground, yet treads the familiar territory it does cover with grace, style, wit and fun.
Latest News for Save the Last Dance
February 13, 2008:
Total Recall: It's a Dance Dance Revolution
Audiences have been historically dismissive of all the critical contempt, pushing dozens of fancy-footed extravaganzas to the upper reaches of the box-office charts.
For this... More...
July 11, 2007:
Mary Elizabeth Winstead Set to "Make It Happen" In Burlesque Flick
If you watched "Live Free or Die Hard" and thought, "Gee, what I'd really like to see is Mary Elizabeth Winstead with less clothing and more dancing," this... More...
August 09, 2006:
Critical Consensus: A Brave New "World," A "Step" Down, And No Screenings for "Pulse" and "Zoom"
This week at the movies, we've got Oliver Stone paying tribute to the heroes of 9/11 ("World Trade Center," starring Nicolas Cage); two youngsters trying to start a... More...
August 10, 2005:
"The Omen" Scares Up Two Stars
Not long ago we informed you that John Moore ("Flight of the Phoenix") was hired by Fox to helm their remake of "The Omen," and now comes word (from Variety)... More...
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