STORY: A motley group of dancers from Mumbai court notoriety before they can actually taste fame. Does the shamefaced group find their rightful place in the world of hip hop?
REVIEW: ABCD2 (short for Any Body Can Dance) is a sequel to the 2013 film that definitely raises the bar from its first part. It gives you dancing delight Varun as its protagonist. And it takes you on a neon-light kissed tour of Las Vegas, the venue for an international hip hop competition. Both Varun and Vegas are easy on the eye as is the film’s heroine Shraddha. However, this true-blue 3D dance film that serves us energy and verve while hip-hopping, dishes out a stale plot.
Suresh (Varun) and Vinnie (Shraddha) along with a bunch of friends, dream of making it big in the world of dance. Their journey starts with a local competition, where they are booed out because they have plagiarised their act.
Labelled cheats, Suresh, who is a part-time waiter and Vinnie, a part-time hairdresser, continue with their dancing dream. They meet Vishnu (Prabhudheva) —India‘s answer to Michael Jackson, who speaks more Tamil than Hindi even in a Bollywood film. Vishnu is also an alcoholic and an insulting bad-ass but Suresh sees as their ticket to the stars. Frankly, this threadbare script throws up silly situations and characters that are caricatures. An attempt to get one person from each Indian community, childish brawls and some insult-trading goras are cliches that are done to death in desi cinema. Like most dance movies (made in the West or Bollywood), the malady we are hit with is that while the dancing is professional, the writing is amateur. So, you whoop and whistle when the dances are on. But stifle a yawn between the gravity-defying grooves. The music is a let-down as is the Shraddha-Varun-Lauren Gottlieb love triangle.
The patriotic fervour in the climax brings a lump to the throat. If only the film had been 15 minutes shorter, the ‘Jai Ho’ would’ve resonated more!