1. Fame Review (2009)<br />Fame was released on 25th September 2009 and directed by Kevin Tacharoen. This highly anticipated American dance musical, a modern remake of the 1980 film of the same, follows the lives of 10 young talents attending New York City School of Performing Arts, all desperately striving to succeed and achieve their personal ambitions and goals, and ultimately Fame!. Set in a grungy urban setting, the students are tossed in toil and crushing disappointment, as whether it’s a matter of an unreasonable parent not allowing their child to sing R’n’B, but classic, or a romantic dilemma – relationship Vs career, each characters’ individual setbacks prove to be obstacles on their course to reaching for the stars.<br />Four years on, and our ‘heroes’, the singer, the dancers, the actor and the filmmaker are still in the same sticky situation. It mainly revolves around the four main characters, Denise (Naturi Naughton) a classical pianist whose struggling to release her inner Beyonce, Malik (Collins Pennie) a rapper with a tragic, touching past whose trying to make it big time, Marco (Asher Book) a rising singer with a good voice but not as much as much drive as the others, and Jenny (Kay Panabaker) a rather shy singer/actor who struggles to bring out the confidence bottled within her. However the camera focuses rather too much on our couple, Marco and Jenny, quite unnecessarily in my opinion, which kills the exciting and exuberating atmosphere that a dance movie or a musical should possess and makes the film drag on.<br />Comparing ‘Fame’ to other major hit dance films gives us a chance to weigh out the best and worst parts of this film and gives us an overlook on the whole movie itself. Firstly although it is categorized under ‘dance’, the school is a performing arts school, not just a dance school, so there are singers, actors, musicians, filmmakers etc. Hence covering different aspects and areas of performing arts, such as music and drama, as well as dance.<br />Like ‘Fame’, ‘Step Up 2: The Streets’ included certain aspects of music etc, as well as dance. However there was more of a thrill to Step Up 2. It was fast paced, packed with varied styles for example, colliding street dance and ballet to create a unique routine which flowed with energy, creativity and power and left the crowds stunned and overwhelmed. Also although ‘Fame’ is supposed to be a musical, the musical factor is not very obvious and there is not much music in the film. A lot of the music used in Step Up 2 was better matched and memorable than even the soundtrack of ‘Fame’ remake. But on the other hand, like ‘Step Up’, ‘Fame’ did conquer the stereotype of ballet being a dance genre for women only. Another stereotype which ‘fame’ proved to be wrong was that all dance films have to do with street dance or hip hop. A film which conquered this same stereotype was ‘Take The Lead’ starring Antonio Banderas (The Legend of Zorro). This film was again jam-packed with a variety of styles and genres of which many were merged together, although their main dance style was tango. This large range of genres and styles made the film a blood-boilingly thrilling movie to watch. ‘Fame’ also broke the pattern of the main characters in the dance film being men, and also men of colour, as films such as ‘Stomp the Yard’ and You Got Served’ portrayed. The dance style in ‘Fame’ was mainly ballet, but i think ‘Fame’ is an unconventional dance film and this is one of the factors which appealed to me about it as i like things that are different and unusual, not the same as others.<br />This movie is a mass produced product. Some of the social factors that influenced Tacharoen’s work on Fame were ‘parent’s not agreeing and wanting child to take performing arts’ and ‘peer pressure’. The cultural factor influencing this film was Alan Parker’s original 1980 version of ‘Fame’ from 20 years ago. Kevin Tacharoen is possibly trying to send the audience a message or teach them that to get to the top takes an enormous amount of courage, confidence, perseverance, dedication and endless hard work, but also setbacks. You learn from your mistakes and your setbacks are what make you stronger. You learn new things all the time, as you grow older, you never stop learning, all from your mistakes. If you don’t make mistakes how are you going to learn and get better? Setbacks are a test to yourself to prove your confidence in yourself. However this message didn’t come across too clearly or wholly as only one of them succeed in the end. But it could be argued that the last scene proved their confidence, their dedication, their courage and their determination. This movie, judging from the casting and the basic storyline etc is targeted at older teenagers, younger adults and adults. But perhaps wouldn’t appeal to elderly people or children.<br />The opening montage of the film unveils a crowd of anxious kids auditioning to grab a place at the best performing arts school in the country. The rapid editing and speed of the short jump cuts to various scenes is at first enjoyable, but then runs too fast, it doesn’t exactly give us a chance to fully and wholly appreciate the dance. But from what’s quickly captured from the quick shots used throughout the movie, the structure and the elements used in the dances are used carefully and well, for example the dance where Alice (Kherington Payne) is dancing to ‘Black and Gold’ by Sam Sparro, there is good use of line, in the positions the 3 women stand, the movements and shape of her arms, legs and even whole body, hint that there was thought put into every move. Alice’s dynamics and movement was planned cautiously too, she varied how soft or sharp her movements were and her range of movements, easy and complex merged together to put her routine in the spotlight. The form, rhythm and structure was also spot on. The 3 women had the right timing and rhythm for the dance to be able to flow at ease. There are many levels and position forms included, complimenting the structure. This dance was choreographed with excellent techniques and elements making it by far one of the best and most dances in the movie.<br />Another downside however was that after the auditions, when we were just getting to know the new crop of students, the fast paced energy and excitement slowly drains as the screen writer, Allison Burnett throws endless strings after strings of clichés at the audience, from a troubled youth from a broken home in the rush of city life, to the dancer who has no personal life, no time for it in fact because of her determined drive to be the dance diva. Allison leaves no cliché behind. This is the story of 10 students who are not talented enough to make the grade. Well, 9 actually, Alice rises above the herd, cutting off her personal life to take up the career that she wants, or rather is driven to follow.<br />‘I’m gonna live forever!’ – Yeah right!. Not in my world!. The endless clichés, added with the restless camera and the constant rhythm of editing, making me unable to solely appreciate the dance and movie, and eventually making me give up trying to appreciate it, and take away the sheer joy and exuberance of the performances. Was it worth a bottom-numbing 107 minutes of my life? Well, given the last and final performance where all the students, except Alice, performed their utmost hardest performance yet, leaving the crowds of parents’ jaws dropped and eventually waking me from my 5 minute nap (I’m just joking!)..I think so!. You could tell that they’d put a lot into their ground breaking last performance at NYC School of Performing Arts and it was worth the effort. So, even though i would rather have watched Tim Burton’s ‘9’ (He’s a genius!) or even ‘Groundhog Day’ (It’s very old, but you’ve got to admit, it’s funny!) over this, I give ‘Fame’ a rating of 2 ½ out of 5 stars.<br />‘Not as good as the Oscar winning original!’<br />