Five Dances

The sensual movement of bodies through space creates a visual language whose infinite variations seduce and fascinate over the course of the film’s numerous rehearsals.

It's a lovely way to open a film that is at its best when it is displaying dancers in motion and exploring the complex dynamics of a rehearsal space.

It's the moments when director Alan Brown stops worrying about clarifying plot and character motivation and lets the performances bring those into being that makes this an authentic project.

The gorgeous physicality is more impressive than the sketchy storyline of this dance-centric drama.

A promising, though static, new film that never leaves its taciturn shadows for a single emotionally gripping moment.

Though the film’s untested cast struggles with the drama, and the sketched-out story is often banal (there are several amateurish calls-to-mom scenes), the presentation of a specific city subculture is etched from the heart.

If only verisimilitude equaled quality. But unfortunately, schmaltzy music and drab melodrama drag down the otherwise graceful moves of Five Dances.