One, Two, Three Steps-Strictly Ballroom-A Film Review

DVD Review

By Sam Lowell

Strictly Ballroom, starring Paul Mercurio, Tara Morice, 1992  

There have been a long line of “feel good” movies that have come out of Hollywood and now out of Australia with the effort under review, Strictly Ballroom, a film dealing with the rigors and stamina necessary to be a successful ballroom dancer, a discipline that from a look at the work ethic portrayed in this film rivals any more overtly recognized athletic endeavor like gymnastics or swimming. A “feel good” movie being one where some problem is overcome during the course of the film involving a struggling person who teams up with another struggling person to overcome some problem and then there is a little off-hand romance to keep the air light. Oh yeah and it helps if in the “feel good” film where a female is involved that the female turns from an unwanted “ugly duckling” into a fetching woman. Under that standard this effort qualifies in spades as a “feel good” movie.     

Here is how it played out. Down Under in Australia Sandy, a second generation ballroom dancer whose star is rising in that rarified world, and who is the great hope of his dance teacher mother and his defeated (by his mother) father who as the film unfolded turned out to have been the great rising star of his generation-except he listened to his own drummer and wound up on cheap street. Sandy faces that same future, it might have been in the DNA, to listen to a different drummer. What was gnawing at Sandy was that he was confined to what had become the same old, same old of ballroom dancing. He wanted to take his dancing to a different level.

Alone comes “ugly duckling” and wannabe big-time dancer Fran who badgers Sandy, against his better judgment at first, to teach her to dance, dance what is in his head winning dance contests be damned. Naturally they “click” first at the dance level, then at the romantic level (as she gets better looking along the way). The key is the Latin beat that white bread Sandy has hidden in him which can be brought out by Latina immigrant Fran, or better her father a master as the Latin specialty -the paseo robles.

Needless to there have to be challenges along the way to “feel good.” Defeat at Fran’s inabilities at first, the demands of Sandy’s mother along with the edicts of the ballroom dancing establishment in Australia to toe the classic line. And then the moment of truth-will Sandy go along with the old school or grab Fran and go for glory if not fame. You can guess the result. See this one if you are feeling blue-and if you are unfamiliar with ballroom dancing as a career. It is fun.