If "Breakin'" was the mother of all modern dance movies, than "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo" is definitely the father.
The '80's spawned many great sequels. Some of the best ever made actually! "Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back", "Back to the Future Part II", "Aliens", the underrated "Halloween II" and some other well known and liked movies such as "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan", "Ghostbusters II" and "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom". And then there's "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo"...
It's a sequel like no other, in many different ways. First of all, it was released in the same year as its predecessor, which already is something that's quite unusual. As a matter of fact, I can't think of any other sequel that got released in the exact same year as its earlier shot and finished predecessor. Even sequels that got filmed back to back normally get released in at least a later year as its predecessor. It's better for marketing and for making money but apparently this movie just didn't care.
It was a sequel that already got announced after the first movie's end credits. This could mean several things. One is that they were very confident about the first movie being a success or another reason could be that they still had plenty of ideas and material left, while shooting the first move, for a whole other movie. Or perhaps they simply had lots of fun doing the first movie and therefore signed up for a second one, even before the first movie got finished. Anyway, not everybody was up for it tough. The movie has a different director and some of the characters from the first movie are missing in this one, most notably the Christopher McDonald character. Christopher McDonald, the man who had previously said yes to "Grease 2" refused to do this sequel. Is that an indication of this movie its quality? Well, the movie as it is more silly than bad really, so it still definitely has some value and quality to it!
When I think of the '80's, I think of bad perms, bad clothing and bad music and this movie has it all! It makes this one of THE quintessential '80's movies. Exploded haircuts, guys wearing bad mustaches, trousers up to people's armpits, guys with tank tops and short tight pants, making them look more feminine than most women who appear in this movie and some bad rap songs and other music styles, with silly lyrics and synthesizers, drum machines and other random noises for its beat.This movie continues to ride on the success of break dancing and the, at the time, new and popular, hot music styles but at the same time also continues to redefine the musical/dance movie genre. Many of the story-elements and characters out of this movie are all things we still get to see in the genre movies of this present day and age. All of the Step Up movies for instance use a similar sort of setup and approach. It's the type of movie that tries to make you believe that dancing has the power to resolve any of your problems, along with all of the other problems in the world. It also literally uses a 'save the rec center' type of plot, which is something that also often gets used in modern type of genre movies, in some way or form.
It's an even sillier movie than its predecessor and it's also most definitely a lesser movie as well, yet at the same time it's also a more watchable and recommendable movie. Its randomness and silliness is actually what makes this movie. Most of the dance scenes are so incredibly random (even more so than was the case in the first movie) and silly to watch, yet you can't take your eyes off of it. It's gloriously silly and stupid, all in a very entertaining to watch way.
Foremost thing that makes this movie still a bad and even at times annoying one is the fact that it has far too many needless distractions in its story. Most of the side-plots are going absolutely nowhere and even the movie itself decides to drop them after a while. There are far too many characters who are falling in love, being jealous, or just doing some random stuff that doesn't make any logical sense. There are a bunch of 'evil' dancers in black for instance, who don't do anything, aside from bothering our heroes from time to time, with silly dance offs. And then there are Kelly's parents, who are of course opposed to their daughter dancing on the streets, alongside 'thugs' wearing big earrings and wide baggy pants and do anything to destroy their daughter's dreams and desires. All a bit too simple, predictable and needless for this movie. It all works out too weak and this is the type of movie that would have worked out better with an even more simplified, straightforward and bare boned story and way of storytelling. Besides, the movie for some odd reason is featuring a sizable amount of comedy in it, that however is just mostly weak and lame. It are things like this that make it apparent this movie had a different director with different views involved. It's Sam Firstenberg's approach that works out more entertaining, yet also definitely sillier but it was Joel Silberg's approach, the director of the first movie, that made a technically better movie.
So if you want pure entertainment, watch this movie! If you want a somewhat more serious and straightforward genre movie, stick with the first movie "Breakin'", or any other random and more recent genre attempt.
4/10
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