To beat the world's best dance crew at a dance-off in Paris, France, German streetdancer Ash (Falk Hentschel) and new friend and manager, Eddie (George Sampson), gather the greatest streetdancers from around Europe, whilst hoping to add a Latin element courtesy of salsa dancer Eva (Sofia Boutella). After a rough start, the group all agree to incorporate this element and have fun adding Latin to street dance; whilst doing this, Ash and Eva grow closer. Two days before the big dance-off, Ash rejects Eva on the dance floor and refers to their fusion dance as a "Little Latin Experiment" when they're up against "The Surge" (Flawless) in a friendly dance-off. The police come and break up the dance-off and Eva runs away. Ash chases her but she doesn't want to know. The next day Ash goes to apologise to Eva but meets her Uncle (Tom Conti) who tells Ash to leave. Ash comes back to explain when he finds Eva's Uncle on the floor. He is rushed to the hospital where Eva meets him and Ash. When Eva's Uncle wakes up, he tells Ash that he should go to the dance-off. Ash and his crew leave for the dance-off and are frustrated to find the gates locked. Ash gets them in wearing popcorn sellers' clothes. They battle Invincible until the last dance where they need Eva. She appears and does the dance as planned. Ash and his crew finish, and are estatic to find they have won. Invincible's leader then hands the trophy to Ash. As everyone celebrates, Ash and Eva share a kiss.
Pablo Baez as Boxing Ring / Latin Party Couple 2[2]
Release
The film was theatrically released on 30 March 2012 by Vertigo Films and was released on DVD and Blu-ray on 24 July 2012 by Entertainment One.
Reception
The film received generally mixed reviews. Rotten Tomatoes reported that 46% (Rotten) of critics gave this film positive reviews.[3]
StreetDance 2 received its first review on 10 February 2012 with Screen International chief film critic, Mark Adams, describing the dancing as "toe-tappingly cool" and stating that lead actress Sofia Boutella is "destined to be a big star".[4]
Box office results for the opening weekend (from Friday 30 March 2012) for Street Dance 2 showed the movie grossed £608,024 and placed fifth in the UK movie box office charts,[5] a result that only managed a quarter of the success Streetdance 3D did, placing it behind The Hunger Games which remained the top-grossing movie for two weeks.[6]
The film caused significant outrage among Algerians living in both France and Algeria due to their compatriot Sofia Boutella's appearance in scenes that are excessively risqué by Algerian standards. Viewing the film as an "insult to Algerian traditions and ethics," some Algerian immigrants in France boycotted the film and a campaign was launched through social networking sites Twitter and Facebook to prevent the showing of the film in Algeria.[7][8]
