Street Dancer 3D delivers what it promises – breathtaking dance. This is closest we’ve got to the Step Up series and that’s an achievement. Team India VS Team Pakistan in London. Team India is Sahej’s (Varun Dhawan) Street Dancers & Team Pakistan is Inayat’s (Shraddha Kapoor) Rulebreakers. The rivalry between them is registered from the moment they meet but there’s no backdrop apart from the religious difference. Brother Inder (Punit Pathak) burdens his dream of winning the Ground Zero dance competition on Sahej (Varun Dhawan).
Anna (Prabhudheva) who runs a hotel shows the reality of stuck immigrants to Inayat and the team. They now want to win the battle to help those immigrants. Sahej with three of his best dancers joins London’s local group The Royals and gets criticised for his decision. Now, what he does next and how well does he do on the path of his ‘homecoming’ is what the rest of the story is all about.
Varun Dhawan gets his moves right and the dancer in him just overshadows the actor in him. That’s what’s required and he has improved a lot since ABCD 2 smoothening his dance moves. Shraddha Kapoor gets no scope to act but she balances that with her beautiful presence on the dance-floor. Though not as good as the professional dancers around her, efforts are truly visible. She deserved a more balanced character to add the value.
Prabhudheva got the maximum cheers in our press show when he just broke into dancing on Muqabla. Won’t even give my two cents neither on his acting chops nor his dancing skills because we all know what’s what. Out of the dancers, Dharmesh gets his act right and enjoys lil bit of both the departments. Nora Fatehi looked the most ‘dancer’ than all the dancers around.
Before we dive deep into the technical aspects, could someone in the comments section remind me why this isn’t called ABCD3? Remo D’Souza’s goes a mile ahead of actually including a story in between all the dance. It’s very manipulating when it introduces the emotional angle but surprisingly it works at places. Good to see how Remo D’Souza takes a dig at dance films, when in a scene Varun says, “4-5 saalo se yahi dance toh kar rahe hai.”
One major thing where the film lacks is its storyline. However good the choreography is when you know who’ll win it ultimately eliminates the thrills. A thought that kept me bothered throughout was, why the makers didn’t go full desi-style street when they had to name this one as Street Dancer? Streets have zero roles to play making the title misleading. The electrifying effect in the initial performance, usage of magical tricks while dancing and a lot happens on the floor which keeps you intrigued.