How She Move (2007)

"How She Moves" springs to life only when its high-energy, talented cast members are kicking up their heels and strutting their stuff for the camera. Otherwise, this stale strive-suffer-and-succeed story is low on energy, low on originality, and low on anything that might make the movie stand out from the dozens of other, likeminded films that have come before it.

Rutina Wesley has modest appeal as the academically gifted inner-city youngster who finds that the best way to raise her private school tuition money is by entering step-dance competitions, but both she and her fellow actors are poorly served by uninspired screen writing and undistinguished direction. As noted earlier, the movie achieves some spark when the performers are up on stage dancing, but such moments are far too few and sadly fleeting.

Fmovies: This film represents every aspiring Canadian performance artist's dream- the chance to be noticed in the United States. To facilitate this ambition, all levels of Canadian Government funnel huge amounts of money to Canadian talent so that they can create vehicles to hock their wares south of the border. Nevermind that the work itself seldom represents the land or the people it comes from.

"How She Move" is a curious creature, a Canadian film that actually doesn't try to be set in America, or be about Americans. Notice my choice of words, though- it is an absence of a negative, not an outright positive. Even though Brooklin and Baltimore are mentioned directly by name, and a large section of the film is set (though not filmed) in Detroit, the only references to Canada are oblique: "T-Dot" "Scarborough" and "Jane Street Junta". Too bad the average American film-goer has no idea what those terms mean.

Even the one shot of Canadian money is the backside of our $20.00 bill, the one Canadian banknote that is the same colour as the US Greenback.

The settings are generic North American urban ghetto, with the high irony of the actual Jane-Finch corridor exterior shots not being gritty enough to pretend they have street cred, so the film crew travels to Hamilton Ontario to ramp up the film's "ghettoness". Not one exterior establishing shot to proudly proclaim "This is Canada".

At least the interior shots of the characters homes are authentic and ring true to some tenements in the Jane-Finch area.

The film even downplays the Caribbean origins of most of the characters, but not to any degree that it downplays its Canadian-ness. But, "downplay" is not "ignore" and there are many subtle references that only someone familiar with the Caribbean colony in Toronto would understand. And I use the phrase "Caribbean Colony" with deliberate purpose.

The story itself is generic to many American films of the same ilk. It is still a valid story, in a sense, since various methods of uplift have always been aspirations of marginalized communities. It is as true in Toronto as any other city in North America.

And the story is told with uncommon passion and integrity, from the characters' and actors' levels.

What really shines in this film is the showcase of Toronto talent. To be sure, all this talent would love to kiss Canada goodbye for a lucrative career in the U.S., but they grew up here, and here is where they are currently shining! That too is part of Canadian culture, but no American would understand that.

To my American friends, I mean no slight- I personally think you are big enough to embrace a true Canadian story if it has the production values that you are used to in your cinema. The mavens in Hollywood are so conservative though that you continue to get spoon-fed pap, and only rarely are you served true art with a degree of risk attached. When films have to make back a $150 Million budget, the owners of that money tend to be risk adverse! This film is getting a wide release in the United States. MTV Films has had a hand in it's financing or distribution, hence the reason why its Canadian-ness is being downplayed. But, in 2008, this is the best Canada can do in bringing its stories to you...by making them seem like YOUR stories.

What a timid little country Canada is! Couldn't any of my tax money put one Canadian flag in a scene? A real TTC bus? A s

Its one of those stereotypical mtv generation dance movies, and I do not see where all this 'its not that bad' rubbish is coming from. The acting is terrible, it follows exactly the same storyline as all the other 'dancing' movies out there. Its terrible! The name should scream don't watch. 'How she move.' Since when can movie titles ignore grammar? At least some dance movies had half decent dance scenes, these ones don't even deserve a watch. I give it a 1 out of 10, just because there is no zero. I seriously implore anyone with an IQ of over 60 not to watch this, and not to waste your money. The 1.6/10 should tell it all. This movie should not have even be made.

How She Move fmovies. Beforehand Notification: I'm sure someone is going to accuse me of playing the race card here, but when I saw the preview for this movie, I was thinking "Finally!" I have yet to see one movie about popular African-influenced dance (be it popular hip hop moves, breaking, or stepping) where the main character was a Black woman. I've seen an excessive amount of movies where a non-Black woman who knew nothing about hip hop comes fresh to the hood and does a mediocre job of it (Breakin, Breakin 2, Save the Last Dance, Step Up), but the Black women in the film are almost nonexistent. That always bothered me considering so much of hip hop, African-influenced dance, and breaking was with Blacks and Latinos in massive amounts in these particular sets and it wasn't always men who performed it, so I felt this movie has been a long time coming. However, the race does not make the film, so I also wanted it to carry a believable plot; the dancing be entertaining; and interesting to watch.

Pros: I really enjoyed this film bringing Jamaican culture. I can't recall ever seeing a popular, mainstream film where all the main characters were Jamaican; had believable accents; and weren't stereotypical with the beanies. The steppers, family, friends, and even the "thugs" were all really intelligent, realistic people who were trying to love, live, and survive in the neighborhood they lived in by doing something positive. Even when the audience was made aware that the main character's sister chose an alternate lifestyle, it still didn't make the plot stereotypical. I was satisfied with the way it was portrayed. I LOVED the stepping; the romantic flirty relationship going on between two steppers; the trials that the main character's parents were going through; and how she dealt with coming back to her old neighborhood and dealing with Crabs in a Barrel. I respected that she was so intelligent and active at the same time, and so many other sistas in the film were handling themselves in the step world. They were all just as excellent as the fellas. I don't see that in too many movies nowadays, at least not those that would be considered Black films.

Cons: I'm not quite sure why the directors or whoever put the movie together did this, but I question whether they've been to real step shows. Whenever the steppers got ready to perform, some hip hop song would play in place of the steppers' hand/feet beats. At a real step show, there is zero need for music, other than to maybe entertain the crowds in between groups. And then when hip hop songs were played, sometimes the beat to the song was off to the beat of the steppers' hands and feet. It was awkward. I was more impressed with the stepping in this movie versus "Stomp the Yard" (another great stepping movie) because the women got to represent as fierce as the guys (in "Stomp the Yard," Meagan Good got all of a few seconds of some prissy twirl and hair flip and the (Deltas?) let out a chant and a few steps and were cut immediately). Even when there were very small scenes, the ladies tore it up, especially in the auto shop, and it was without all that music to drown out their physical music. I know soundtracks have to be sold, but the movie folks could've played the music in other parts of the film.

I'm not a Keyshia Cole fan, so every time I saw her, all I kept thinking was "Is it written in the script for her to constantly put her hand on her hip when she talks?" She looked uncom

I watch them all.

It's not better than the amazing ones (_Strictly Ballroom_, _Shall we dance?_ (Japanese version), but it's completely respectable and pleasingly different in parts.

I am an English teacher and I find some of the ignorance about language in some of these reviews rather upsetting. For example: the "name should scream don't watch. 'How she move.' Since when can movie titles ignore grammar?"

There is nothing inherently incorrect about Caribbean English grammar. It's just not Canadian standard English grammar. Comments about the dialogue seem off to me. I put on the subtitles because I'm a Canadian standard English speaker, so I just AUTOMATICALLY assumed that I would have trouble understanding all of it. It wasn't all that difficult and it gave a distinctly different flavour as the other step movies I have seen were so American.

I loved that this movie was set in Toronto and, in fact, wish it was even more clearly set there. I loved that the heroine was so atypically cast. I enjoyed the stepping routines. I liked the driven Mum character. I felt that many of the issues in the movie were addressed more subtly than is characteristic of dance movies.

In summary, if you tend to like dance movies, then this is a decent one. If you have superiority issues about the grammar of the English standard you grew up speaking, your narrow mind may have difficulty enjoying this movie.

Well, if you are open-minded enough to have liked Barber Shop, then you will like this Canadian film.

If your mind is as closed-minded as Fort Knox, then you will give it the current score that it has : 2.5.

This is a film for anybody prepared to watch films from outside of their own racial grounds. It is engaging, it is true to life, on two or three occasions you lose the connections between the scenes, but many times, especially towards the end, you find yourself having a tear or two in your eyes and this simply because it so often mirrors what life can be like.

I like it and recommend it to anyone open minded beyond the traditional American film.