ABCD - ANY BODY CAN DANCE - 2

Recently, Remo D'Souza came up with the sequel to ABCD, the striking sleeper hit, it was predictable that the star power and the 3D effects in the sequel might make the movie a bigger hit than the original.

 

It sounds hurtful, but there are a few common threads between Varun Dhawan and Shraddha Kapoor's first dance movie ABCD 2 and Shah Rukh khan and Deepika Padukone's Happy New Year.

 

Both movies show the lead characters travelling to foreign locations straight from the streets of Mumbai to win a dance championship. Both SRK and Varun's teams are mocked for being cheaters and both movies have their own versions of the famous 70-minute monologue from Chak De! Fortunately for us, the similarities between the two movies end here. The big difference between the two is that if Happy New Year was a suffering, ABCD 2 is a movie Bollywood can be proud of producing any time. It is a treat of dance performances that will leave you mighty enthralled. 

 

Apparently based on the 'Fictitious' dance group from Mumbai's far-flung suburb Nalasopara, ABCD 2 revolves around Suresh (Varun Dhawan) and Vinnie (Shraddha Kapoor), who lead the Mumbai Stunners dance group. When the Stunners are accused of copying a dance act in a competition, they lose the respect of their fans and become the subject of mockery and scorn.

 

A distressed Varun, who is the son of a famous dancer, decides to regain his lost glory by participating in the international hip-hop competition at Las Vegas and thanks his stars when he comes across Vishnu Sir (Prabhudheva), an iconic but alcoholic choreographer, who is hesitant to help the Stunners. After much persuading, Vishnu decides to help them and what happens later forms the rest of the plot.

 

Varun, who had last mesmerized us with his realistic performance in Badlapur', plays the well-groomed Suresh with an endearing honesty and it is tough to not like the brave waiter, who dreams to make it big despite all odds. Shraddha Kapoor as Vinnie tends to get on one's nerves with her lively character. Prabhudheva moves like greased lightning and that is enough for the film. Lauren Gottlieb has a short role as Olive and doesn't get to do much. The rest of the dancers like Dharmesh, Raghav Juyal, Sushant Pujari, Punit Pathak, Jineet Rath and others are in fact the real heroes of the movie for their flawless dance moves and also their natural acting. Indeed, the movie would have been incomplete without these stalwarts of the dance floor.

 

When ABCD had released a couple of years back, no one had taken it seriously in the beginning because of the lack of a star cast and because dance movies were something that apparently worked only in Hollywood. But, Remo, Prabhu, Ganesh Acharya and the team had won our hearts with the movie, generally with the dance sequences and the relatable underdog story. Sadly, the same cannot be said for the sequel.

 

Agreed that the movie has a better star cast than the prequel, but that is not an assurance of success. The dance sequences are mind-blowing as natural, but the movie lacks a heart and a soul.  The climax too is expectable.

 

Also, dissimilar in the prequel, the characters in ABCD 2 are not well etched at all and fail to strike a chord with the viewers. If you felt the anguish of the dancers in ABCD, here all you feel is impatience at their melodrama and you keep waiting for the dance sequences to start. The romance between Suresh and Vinnie also seems forced.

 

Overall, it is worthy to watch once for the dance sequences.