Review: Footloose (2011)

   
    I was finally able to see Footloose, the remake of the movie with the same name from 1984, which stars Kevin Bacon. Now, I am going to go on and say it, you cannot replace Kevin Bacon or John Lithgow, but what you can do is expand on several parts of the story that the original did not. The writers added more story scenes and details to scenes that were missing from the original. That and very well choreographed dance sequences are why this is a good remake.
    The story of Footloose is fairly simply, a young teen moves into a town that has banned all dancing, among other things, in public for anybody under the age of 18 and he eventually fights it. But, there is a little more to it than that. First, the story is expanded, by that we get more background on the characters in many scenes. This is particularly true in the opening scene where we get to experience, this time, why the town decided to introduce many laws for teenagers. Second, we get more of a background on our two main characters, Ren MacCormack and Ariel Moore played by Kenny Wormald and Julianne Hough respectively, in several scenes that go into greater detail about their past.
    The cast is not completely unknown and they do a good job overall, especially Dennis Quaid, who plays Reverend Shaw Moore, the father of Ariel. Now, he can't replace John Lithgow, but in this remake the writers used his character more and is present in more scenes where he is trying to uphold the ban. There are also many emotional scenes that he does a good job in. There are many unknowns in this movie and we start with the main character, Kenny Wormald. This is one of his first roles and he does a good job most of the time although he struggles in the faster paced moments, but he does better in the slower scenes. Also, he does almost all of his own dance moves because he has a dancing background, so it was good to see that in the film.
    Julianne Hough is not the greatest actress and you can tell that she tries to hard to act like a young immature teenager, she struggles in several of the emotional scenes. However, with her dancing background as well she does a very good job in the dancing scenes and reacts with the other dancers very well, the chemistry fits her better when she is dancing. The only real problem actor is Miles Teller, who plays Willard. He also is young and this was one of his first roles too, but he had to have an accent for this role, which you can hear him go in and out of several times. He has a hard time in the emotional and the more fun and exciting scenes. With some of the actors struggling the movie does get cheesy several times, but it is made up when it comes to the music and dancing.
    Footloose is a fun movie with very well choreographed dance scenes from beginning to end. There are several throughout the movie that are entertaining and exciting to watch. With that being the case, this film also has good editing during the dance scenes making them more fast paced. Of course what is dancing without music, well that is another high point of the movie. It has a great soundtrack with the new songs and the mix of older songs from the original. However, dancing is not the only thing this movie is about, it is also about love, friendship, and trust. This is a good, not great, remake but, trust me, you won't fall asleep during this one. 3/4 Stars.