Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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LIGHTS! REACTION! DANCE WITH ME (out of Five stars) "Dance With Me" takes a younj Cuban, Rafael Infante, and puts hin in Texas as a handyman in a failinj Latin dance studio where an old frien* of his mother's is kind enough to givi him a job. Ruby and the others in th< studio are in training for the world dano championships where Ruby hopes ti relaunch her professional dance career Starring Vanessa L. Williams Chayanne, Kris Kristofferson. Direct /y Cypress Run is a brand : located in the J Featuring: S lived in be one and two Bee homes are n Conveniently Iocs and the Do Only minutes a\ Please ca * Say you saw us in the Gamecc (803) 3430 Broj v^uiuiuuu * Special re / / I . "7 / X- ,, II / / ? jr < *,., ? ~J-~ - / ^ ?-JL~???J / / i ? 1998 ifkmail Corporation - *?'v ' % ir ed by Randa Haines. Produced by Lauren C. Weissman, Shainya Egawa, Randa Haines. gamecocck critic JENNIFER STANLEY * I I've decided. I like tap. No tango * or Latin dances for this critic. I "Dance With Me" had poor dialogue, i poor plot and poor photography. Maybe e the producers were trying for something e like "Swingers." But that's not going to s happen. This is the very basic, very bor3 ing, very slow story about a Cuban man's ' journey to find his biological, American , father. new Apartment Complex St. Andrews area. pacious, never fore studio, iroom Apartment low available. tted to all interstates wntown area, vay from Campus. 11 for rates. )ck and no deposit will be required. 212-9888 id River Road a, S.C. 29210 Pgl strictions apply. ^ ^v i id ' ^ ^ 'v" ^; * '" *' ;; : / / / 1 # $ :f # ' ' / / I I / / I I M .. . M [ JP " ^ J J / 1 I I ' ~ 7 " I I ?< '# ?j I I i 1 7 I X J ll *^r Jf ^ ^ " I ^ ^ v/ J I JS|i|H^Pt ^ ; ':9R|^^B J Rafael Infante (Chayanne) takes Ru studio where Ruby is training for tf: Raphael meets Ruby, a competitor in the world of professional dancing, and after just a 10-word argument and a burrito they fall in love. Chayanne should be a sleazy soap opera star, not a big-screen actor. Vanessa Williams has the sad, betrayed look down, but unfortunately has no other dimensions mm when you want 20 million other eirc is you get your email from ; i you need it. ii account at www.hof * ; : . .i.! V,! " - : , V o ;. i y : : . . , . ; : ' ' ' ; , : ' ' " i " ' < - 'stv^'5 'w* - is - .- . . . I ' M _ , ^ iy.uA rtyr ' rriiiiTirfiWifr Ji?Mi "V % * ; i ^ ,-n pp ^ . L by (Vanessa L. Williams) out d* re world dance championships to her acting. The other character stereotypical. The only redeeming factor wa choreography. The Latin music an design along with the dancing wei teresting but took up too much c more than two hours of the movie. "Dance With Me." Don't even both rent it. 4 1 1 K| w K m ' ? m9i incing his style. Rafael is a Cuban immigrc where she hopes to relaunch her professic sare gamecock critic RUTH NETTLES * sthe id set My hopes in seeing "Dance With re in- Me" were that it would be both a good if the display of dancing as well as a good Skip movie in general Instead, it was a slightier to ly enjoyable display of dancing and a bad movie in general. * i I I I I . , V. I : :s: 111 I ?V -*Y r\ ~\ \ ? J-7 1 I JL ?? \ V |^ 1 1 I 1 I 1 ? ' w '4.": "1"' I IfnT7 71 SPE<X\L TO THE GAMECOCK uit working as a handyman in the >nal dance career. Many movies have predictable outcomes, but the audience still wonders at least a little if their predictions will come true. There is nothing to wonder about in "Dance With Me." Every outcome of every bit of plot is blatantly obvious to even a child as soon as the characters appear on-screen. The dialogue (what there was of it) was horribly weak. There were one or two humorous side comments from time to time, but that was all And then there was also the absolute lack of outward emotional expression. I must admit that, to an extent, I enjoyed the many (emphasis on "many") lengthy dance scenes. But I can also turn on the television and watch real professional ballroom competition in which the dancers actually act like profoeeinn ol o iUOOiUUCUO. Vanessa L. Williams, Chayanne, and the studio's other dancers admittedly did a good job of pretending to be professional dancers. Unfortunately, in reality, they are professional actors instead, and so a good job of pretending isn't quite enough if you're used to watching the real thing. And if you aren't used to watching the real thing, then you certainly don't want to sit through this. All of this with Williams' amazing (and annoying) Miracle-Gro hair extensions combines to make one of the worst movies I've seen in a long time. "Dance With Me" gets its one star solely based on the attempt at a portrayal of Latin dance competition. A sad attempt, but a little credit for the effort. If you really want to see the dancers, wait until video. gamecock critic EMIUE GREENE (none) I had extremely low expectations before I went to see "Dance With Me," and sadly, the movie was even worse than I anticipated. A lack of conflict, quality dialogue, and interesting characters left the movie void of anything except really bad acting and some interminable dance scenes. Neither Vanessa L. Williams nor Chayanne displayed any semblance of talent. Between the two of them, they have a range of perhaps five facial expressions, none of which appears genuine. This was made even more apparent by the fact that there were no conversations in the movie at all. Ocnocinno 11 tr fV?nmiiM nvnknrirrn o fonr vaaivsii.cu.ij cuvj yyuuiu caviicuigc a ictt short sentenoes, but no real dialogue exists. Then again, the plot is so transparent that it needs no explanation. Rafael (Chayanne) leaves Cuba to go to work in Texas for an old friend of his mother's, John (Kris Kristofferson). The work is as a handyman at a suffering dance studio where Ruby (Williams) practices for the world dance championships. Is it any surprise that John is Rafael's long-lost father? No. Does it come as a shock that Ruby and Rafael fall in love? No. Can Rafael dance and save the studio? Of course he can. I am not giving anything away because everything is apparent within the first 10 minutes, and no one should voluntarily go see this movie anyway. There are several extremely long j i i i * aance sequences, wnicn Dorea me tremendously since there was no chemistry among any of the actors, even the supporting ones. What made the movie completely unbearable, though, was the fact that it was over two hours long. The length made this already bad film absolutely tortuous. I thought about giving it a half of a star because Rafael does pick up one dancer with just one hand, but you can see that sort of trick in figure skating, which is much, much more entertaining. )