Take the Lead: Critic Reviews

Antonio Banderas is a charming and talented man, but in Take the Lead he lays on the old-world panache so thick -- the accent, the flowery courtliness, the romance of romance -- that he comes off like Dracula's metrosexual cousin.

A dance teacher turns students at a South Bronx high school from gawky ducklings into gliding swans in this sloppy but mildly endearing pop fairy tale.

Think of it as the fictionalized version of last year's engaging documentary Mad Hot Ballroom, with teen dancers and sexier moves. It is also more formulaic and cliched, thanks to the predictable plot and theme.

The film is long on flashy dance sequences and short on depth, character and craft.

As sweet and well-meaning as parts of the movie are, the filmmakers don't appear to trust their teenage audience to take this world seriously.

Take the Lead is like that -- it may seem hokey, but it uses the tried and true to get a smile out of you every time.

Like its star, the movie verges on hooey but cuts too stylish a swath to dislike for long.

The eye-popping dance numbers and affecting performances by the young leads, as well as Mr. Banderas and Ms. Woodard, make it worth the ride.

Take the Lead is the latest example of a silly and utterly predictable movie where the kids dance in the streets and we pray for a fleet of Humvees to come along and run them out of town.

Antonio Banderas is reason enough to see the movie.

The latest ballroom dance-fever picture isn't very good, but some of the dancing is fun.

It's a ballroom/hip-hop mash-up that, although at times discordant and at all times familiar, moves with Banderas' brio and bounce.

If hokiness were a fatal flaw, Take the Lead would be dead from the opening note, yet this feel-good musical drama is irresistibly endearing.

What slop. Take the Lead is a rotted ground chuck of a movie, made up of the rancid processed parts of a plethora of films, good and bad, that have come before it. At first it seems awfully familiar, and then it just seems awful.

The filmmakers who dreamed up Take the Lead probably got a bonus for coming up with such a marketable concept. Mix a little Dangerous Minds with a bit of Save the Last Dance and, voila, a flick with across-the-board appeal.

[Take the Lead] hits all its marks, but never dazzles anyone with its footwork.

Like the recent Glory Road, Take the Lead tweaks a true story to sell more tickets. But at what point do movies like this one begin to fuel the racial hatred that they ostensibly deplore?

Cute as a boutonniere and bouncy as a swing beat, Take the Lead is an 'inspired by a true story' spin on Mad Hot Ballroom.

Take the Lead is pure entertainment, if only for the endless amusement of watching Banderas spread the gospel of ballroom like he was born wearing a tuxedo.

Si, Antonio is a charming man, but by the final bows the movie around him is all left feet and bruised angles, and much more of a farrago than a fandango.

While we may be able to pretty much guess everything that's going to happen in Take the Lead, its considerable charm lies in the way it fulfills, rather than bucks, our expectations.

One of the year's most uninspired inspirational stories.

The production is not without its spirited numbers, but when it looks like it's going to finally take flight, it ends up taking too many false steps, especially during an especially choppy finale.

You could go out and see this feel-good facsimile and be moderately entertained, or rent Mad Hot Ballroom and feel yourself becoming genuinely moved by the real thing.