ABCD (Any Body Can Dance)

You'd wonder why it took so long before Bollywood finally came up with its own dedicated film about dance. With dance incorporated into just about every film, perhaps that was reason enough not to have a movie that dwells within the confines of a dance premise, which the US has in its Step Up franchise and UK with its StreetDance equivalent. But the lucrativeness of these franchises mean untapped opportunity, so why not make one and dabble with the 3D technology as well? The result is the aptly titled ABCD - Any Body Can Dance, because if anything, every character here does show off a thing or two, of the rhythm within.

And not to mention the success of the wildly popular Dance India Dance television series that also made that final push for box office potential, with some of the participants also making it to the film in leading roles. The storyline by Tushar Hiranandani is kept functional, and really simple. After all, all you need is an excuse to assemble a crew, and have them put through the paces in rehearsals and competition whether underground or official, to have highly choreographed item numbers to thrill the movie going audience. It begins with the rivalry within Jahangir Khan (Kay Kay Menon) and Vishnu (Prabhu Deva), the brains behind JDR, a dance troupe who is once again crowned champions in the nationwide Dance Dil Se competition, only for the former to kick out the latter through the employment of foreign talent.

It took a while before things started to pick up, because of the necessity for Vishnu to go through the motion of moping about what he should be doing, whether to go back to Chennai and continue teaching dance, or hang around in New Delhi to take another potshot at Dance Dil Se, with a vastly different crew. And helping him assemble something is good friend Gopi (Ganesh Acharyaas), although the members they finally get into their troupe are hardly any professional to begin with.

Like any self-respecting dance movie, this is again the requisite characters necessary to impart values like teamwork, camaraderie, trust, loyalty, and more essentially, dance skills through various training montage. And having a rag-tag crew also allowed little subplots to creep in, such as romantic rivalries, parental objections to all things modern and deemed destructive to culture, envy, melodrama, and drug abuse even, that allows individual characters their respective share of the limelight, given so many supporting ones who will inevitably fall by the wayside.

As far as competition goes, we don't really get to see much of JDR in action, especially since they're progressively turned into a balletic outfit courtesy of their new choreographer from the US imparting something that's quite lacking in the imagination. After all, they're an outfit who are dancing to impress, moving away from Vishnu's, and their original philosophy of dancing to express. So we follow DDR for the most parts, in watching how Vishnu whips up a motley bunch into a well oiled machine able to take on some of the best, especially with its inventive choreography.

Which in truth belonged to the multitude of choreographers that Bollywood is no lack of, providing an opportunity to showcase various dance forms through DDR's execution and their march towards the finals of the Dance Dil Se competition. Even Prabhu Deva playing Vishnu has to put his foot where his mouth is, given once central spot before the interval to dance and demonstrate a thing or two why he is and still at the top of his game. Unlike the Hollywood counterparts, the camera-work and editing here all combined seamlessly in providing the audience with the best possible vantage point in which to observe the dance and dancers, and nary did any put on the wrong foot such that you'd miss something crucial to their movement. It's only a pity though that there's no screen in Singapore showing the 3D version, as you can tell that deliberate care has been taken to craft this for the 3D medium.

While some dance choreography and sub-plots may have already been suspiciously experienced before in other films, there's no doubt that the key ingredient to the film's success is its ability to blend culture into dance, which will whip up any audience into a frenzy. And I suppose that is the key message, that while things we share and experience can be universal, culture is what will truly make a people stand out and differentiate themselves for the better. And in this case, if others can make a dance film, so can India, and doing it even better! For those venturing into dance movies fo the first time, ABCD should be on the top of your list, and for fans of dance movies, this is something you'll not want to miss!

P.S. It's interesting to note that besides the Smoking is Injurious to Health warning at the start of every Bollywood movie of late that features scenes that have characters smoking, a little warning also appears at the bottom of the screen just when the deed is about to be done!

I have always believed that music has no boundary. After watching ABCD , my saying has changed and I would say that dancing "pumps up your heartbeat , refreshes your mind and will make you forget about all the pain in life". Any Body Can Dance is the bible for dancing which will entertain right from the beginning till the end.

A brilliant choreographer is fired by his own company after they claim that his dance skills are old-fashioned. To prove his mettle , he starts his own company by hiring group of wanna-be dancers and even some local goons.

Directed by Remo ( FALTU) , ABCD takes you by complete surprise with excellent presentation of dancing skills and beautiful choreography. Remo , being a great choreography himself, does a superb job as director making sure that film is made with universal appeal. The story line is strong with Prabhudeva being the soul of the film. Watch for him dancing extensively in the disco scene and you will know he is one of the best dancers in the country. Screenplay is tight keeping you engaged. Cinematography is eye-catching capturing the wonderful choreography with ease. Editing is crispy. Dialogues are good. Background score gels well with the flow of the film. However , I felt music could have been better considering it to be a musical movie. Barring tuneful "Bezuban" with wonderful picturization , other songs were average. Kay Kay Menon did fine job as a shrewd as Jahangir Khan. Other performance were nice.

Overall , ABCD was heart-wrenching dance movie which will leave you spellbinding with excellent dance moves and eye-catching choreography. Excellent 4.5/5

Remo D'Souza is a dilettante in the art of storytelling. He isn't able to proficiently explain and construct his character motivations and narrative respectively nor is he able to write something truly novel. His films' themes are predictable and visibly repetitive, his plots have hardly any complexity and both his works are I believe borrowed from Hollywood ideas (his first feature film disaster 'F.A.L.T.U' was the Hindi version of a 2005 movie 'Accepted'). The only difference between his debut attempt and sophomore effort is that the latter has its heart in the right place for the obvious reason that the movie is all about 'dance' and not some faltu 's.h.i.t' (those who've watched Accepted will get the pun).

Yes, Remo D'Souza is a dilettante in the art of storytelling, but he is doubtlessly a virtuoso in the arts of dance and choreography and with the perfect theme to complement his talents, he is able to put up a mildly albeit consistently entertaining work that has a clearer vision and cleaner execution than his dismally wonky 'F.A.L.T.U'. His cast in 'ABCD' also has a major role in realizing his vision successfully, mainly because the actors who played dancers are dancers themselves in real life and so they are able to understand their characters and their struggles much easily without looking too artificial or schmaltzy.

ABCD, acronym for Anybody Can Dance, uses the classic theme of competitive rivalry with Jahangir Khan (played by Kay Kay Menon) the pompous, calculative and ego-maniacal head of a prestigious dance academy clashing with Vishnu (played by Prabhu Deva), the former head choreographer at his academy who quits after Jahangir relegates him to desk-job duties just to accommodate a new foreign choreographer. Jahangir's monomaniacal ambition is to win awards, name, fame, money and personal glory and he heedlessly crushes anyone who comes in his way. Vishnu on the other hand believes that the best man should win, and so he leads life righteously and encourages his protégés to do the same. When Vishnu moves in with his old buddy Gopi (played by Ganesh Acharya), he discovers immense latent potential in some of the youth there and makes up his mind to teach them everything he knows for free. The motley of youngsters is divided into two rival gangs, one led by Rocky and the other by D; Rocky's gang is less tapori (street) than D's gang, and they are the ones who readily accept Vishnu's offer. Slowly, Vishnu's team builds with D's gang joining in first, then a few others in the locality and lastly Rhea, the lead dancer of Jahangir Dance Academy who quits after being fondled by Jahangir during rehearsals. Both the rival groups enter a national dance event similar to the popular Dance India Dance show (most of the dancers in the movie are former contestants of the show) and try giving their best shot at winning the prestigious title, but Vishnu's group has to overcome many obstacles on the way.

A surprising thing about ABCD is that its story is'nt flat. I liked the way they used Ganesh Chaturti as an important motif in the film and was impressed by the manner in which Jahangir and Vishnu's ongoing rivalry parallels with Rocky and D's. There is a scene towards the climax of the film when we realize someone from Vishnu's group has switched loyalty and joined hands with Jahangir's group, and here we are kept in suspense for about a minute where we are keen to know whether the person whom everyone suspense indeed turns out to be the Judas. Well, I do not intend to reveal the suspense which is surprising in an effective way, and the entire sequence leading to the climax is well shot. My personal favorite dance sequence is when Vishnu's group perform dressed as clowns after being told off in the previous round that they were only selected to 'entertain like clowns and get TRPs'. The movie does drag in the middle and I feel it is because the screenwriters didn't have much in mind about what to do with all these dancers and so they added some uninteresting and trivial subplots that don't really add up to anything consequential.

The thing that's helped a lot in saving the film is the cast, which is quite likable. Everyone in the theater except me knew the dancers since I'm the only guy who doesn't watch Dance India Dance, yet I smiled often at the cast's peppy presence and genuine attempt at filling their roles; it shows that despite being paid comparatively marginal fee and having zero or little acting experience, these dancers at least bother trying unlike those mega- stars like Salman and Akshay Kumar who've being doing every new role on autopilot. I felt throughout ABCD that Prabhu Deva really cared about the film, and this could be seen in his performance; he is no Gene Kelly, he has little of Kelly's suaveness and charisma but in this particular film, his lack of screen presence works to an extent as his character is supposed to be selfless plus he does compensate for that in his lengthy but exciting dance number. Ganesh Acharya's casual charm made him noticeable but he has got to lose some weight. The dancers all try hard, especially the guy who plays the alcoholic (but his solo creeped me out) and bubbly Lauren Gottlieb whom I instantly recognized being a fan of So You Think You Can Dance. Kay Kay Menon has the best part in the film, and he shines during the movie's resolution which I won't reveal!

The title ABCD reminds me of the Pixar film Ratatouille; while the former doesn't explicitly state the relevance of the title, the latter does and the quote, which applies to ABCD goes like this: 'not everyone can be a great artist(or dancer), but a great artist can come from anywhere'. I am satisfied.

Any Body Can Dance (ABCD) was awesome movie for all dance lover...I really appreciate a hard work done by remo d'souza. must watch :)

All are good in this movie and specially prabhu deva dance is super to watch.

Ramesh sir and others are super duper and dance also awesome done by these people.

Story is not bad and D, Chandu and other character done great work with this movie and have respect after watching by people.

good steps taken by dancers and we can also wait for future if remo d'souza direct any other dance movie.

A great dance movie from the house of Bollywood, starring - non other than the Michael Jackson of India.

Some excellent dance numbers with mind blowing performances. KK is as usual- spot on in his role. Some sudden twists in the plot, which make the movie even more exciting. Lauren is a great dancer, but she proved that she is a good actor too.

It's a different movie which has a story well presented along with some nice dance performances. It clearly reveals the hidden talent of India and proves that India can dance too. Hats off to Remo - for this brave initiative. He undoubtedly complied the movie with a clever brain & pure heart.

A must watch for dance lovers!!