by MATTHEW HAYS, SARAH ROWLAND and MARK SLUTSKY

Take the Lead

This’ll sound familiar. A tough inner-city high school, a group of tough, disenfranchised kids who’ve fallen through the cracks and a passionate teacher who dares to “take the lead” and inspire them. Oh, and it’s all (very loosely) based on a true story. Lead on Me—I mean, Take the Lead—is nothing new, as inspiring teachers who straighten out poor urban youth practically have a union in Hollywood already. But for what it’s worth, Take the Lead more or less stands up on its own merits.

Pierre Dulaine is a ballroom dancing teacher who, some years ago, managed to convince New York schools to admit the tango, the waltz and the fox trot into their curricula, and, as a matter of fact, his program has already been featured in a doc: Mad Hot Ballroom.

Take the Lead takes a few liberties in fictionalizing the story, moving the program from grade schools to a violent NYC high school. Antonio Banderas is Dulaine, who, when he’s not biking around in a tuxedo, volunteers to teach the unruliest students at an uptown high school how to dance all fancy-like. Well, allegedly unruliest, let’s say, as these are really the nicest bad kids you’ve ever seen, and for some reason the exact same students are in detention every day. But hey, it’s a movie, right? You know the drill, the kids resist at first, then learn to dance, then get all confident and stuff, and then there’s a big competition. It’s all very predictable but likeable enough nonetheless. (MS)

Sidekick

Comic book nerds can rejoice: Sidekick is the low-budget answer to their geeked-out dreams. Perry Mucci plays the ultimate office nerd, crushy on the company receptionist, loving his comic books at night. When he notices that a corporate-climbing star (David Ingram) has telekinetic powers, he offers to help him hone them. Mucci, who comes across like a Jimmy Olsen-Pee-wee Herman hybrid, envisions Ingram becoming something out of the comics: Victory Man, a superhero fighting the forces of evil, with Mucci tagging along as a faithful sidekick. But Mucci’s plans go awry when it turns out that Ingram really has superpowers, but is a complete asshole. There’s no Clark Kent or Peter Parker here—Ingram’s selfishness more closely resembles Lex Luthor.

Sidekick has some things in its favour, in particular a certain naïvete that is occasionally charming—not to mention an opening credit sequence that is stellar. There’s also something refreshing about seeing a superhero movie that becomes so dark and is on such a low budget (as opposed to the glitzy studio stuff we’re used to). But there are also odd bits, including a muted performance by Daniel Baldwin (playing a comic book store owner!), who looks strikingly like Fred Flintstone here. And Sidekick makes one crucial no-no for a superhero movie: it takes itself way, way too seriously. Honestly, we are talking about comic-book stuff here—this film would have benefited from some indication that the people behind it have a sense of humour. (MH)

Free Zone

Natalie Portman proves she can cry on demand in the opening scene of this drab drama and that’s about all she does. It’s only after 10 minutes of snivelling that we finally find out what’s got her so down: She’s a New Yorker who just dumped her fiancé whom she was living with in Jerusalem. With nowhere else to go, she begs her mother-in-law’s off-duty chauffeur, Hanna (Hanna Laslo) to take her on a long drive anywhere. As it turns out, the driver has a little family business to take care of in Jordan’s Free Zone. And so begins the road-trip between the chatty but heartbroken American and the frantic Jewish housewife.

Once there, a Palestinian woman Leila (Hiam Abbass), who supposedly owes Hanna money, refuses to buck up unless they drive her to a mysterious third party who apparently has the cash. And so begins the second road-trip. This time, the young and beautiful Portman spends her time refereeing the two feuding menopausal women—just when you think that Hanna and Leila are gonna give it a rest, another hysterical bitch fest breaks out. If director Amos Gitai’s goal was to highlight the irreconcilable differences between the Israelis and Palestinians, mission accomplished. After watching Free Zone, viewers are left with nothing but the undeniable feeling that peace in the Middle East is an impossibility. In a word: depressing. (SR)

Sidekick, Take The Lead and Free Zone open Friday, April 7

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