No honey, not tonight.

Rating: Null/10 (23 February 2004)

Our honey needs money, moves and fame. Alba plays an upbeat dancer seeking what many teenage mtv video afficiandos desire: face and body time in front of a camera, success on a diet of limited talent. While admitting a partiality for mainstream dance films generally -- I saw and enjoyed Billy Elliot as well the ribald Can We Dansu (Can We Dance) --, this film had one mortal flaw: the film's heroine cannot dance. It was simply clear throughout the film that every background dancer to be shown the moves by Alba could already shake her booty better. The rest of the film held few surprises and traded on the usual cliches. The innocent girl with the golden heart wanting to "make a difference" and give the local kids a "better life". The decent boyfriend whose main role in the film was to be... a decent bf. The vapid pretty, pretty vapid girlfriend, ticked because the two couldn't go shopping together. The manager, just sleazy enough to want to debauch her, but not so sleazy as to be threatening or even interesting. The kids from the hood looking like they just stepped out of a pimple-free middle class suburban day school rather than outta the bronx. The film I saw which most resembled Honey in target audience was Save the Last Dance (2001) starring Julia Stiles. While not as good as the two first mentioned dance films, it still beats Honey by miles. I might have written a better review for Honey if the film had had more ambition. But why search for excuses for a film made with little love and even less savvy. No Honey, please, not tonight.