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Salsa
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| Year: |
1988
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Director: |
Boaz Davidson
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| Stars: |
Robby Rosa, Rodney Harvey, Magali Alvarado, Miranda Garrison, Moon Orona, Angela Alvarado, Loyda Ramos, Valente Rodriguez, Daniel Rojo, Humberto Ortiz, Roxan Flores, Robert Gould, Deborah Chesher, Willie Colón, Celia Cruz, Kenny Ortega, Tito Puente
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| Genre: |
Musical, Drama, Romance |
| Rating: |
  5 (from 1 vote) |
| Review: |
Rico (Robby Rosa) is a mechanic and the breadwinner for his family since his father died, but likes to spend most of his time dancing, much to his boss's chagrin. He aims to be the King of Salsa at a contest held in La Luna, a nightclub named after its celebrity owner (Miranda Garrison), the first prize being a trip to dance in Puerto Rico - how can Rico resist a chance such as this? But he will find the road to success a rocky one, especially seeing as he has to look out for his sister Rita (Magali Alvarado), still at school, and make sure his love life does not interfere with his ambitions on the dancefloor...
Thus Cannon tried to cash in on another profitable craze, that of, you guessed it, salsa, illustrating that Golan and Globus did not rely on machine gun fire and explosions to bring in the punters, they had other strings to their bow as well. This was more in the vein of Breakin' and its sequel, in that the dancing was undeniably impressive, but the plot left much to be desired, though they had an ace up their sleeve with Robby Rosa, who was the main reason this became a cult movie among Puertoricans. He had gained fame with Ricky Martin in a boy band called Menudo, and this movie was one of the projects he worked on away from that localised though highly successful endeavour.
Whatever you think of his acting, you have to admit the boy could dance, which was just as well when you sat through what passed for a story. Granted it didn't matter too much when the whole film was a delivery system for the musical numbers, but Rico, dynamo that he was, was pretty hard to put up with seeing how he treated those around him, and he was meant to be the hero. But in that character he had to go on a journey to self-discovery, which meant giving his sister a break and settling on the right woman for him, who was not difficult for us in the audience to spot, but evidently Rico was not the sharpest knife in the drawer, so spent the whole ninety minutes or so messing about.
Until he acknowledges his original choice was the correct one, but though there were those prepared to take Salsa very sincerely for Rosa's sake, for others it was decidedly on the sillier side of the tracks, which is of course reason to appreciate it all the more if you're in that frame of mind for outright camp. Cannon definitely knew their market, so the soundtrack was packed with Latin American stars singing away, and those stars even showed up for tiny cameos, unlikely to be recognised by the wider audience but for Puertoricans just the ticket for maximum endorsement. Those sequences were bursting with energy, and if this was admittedly second rate in other ways, it was seeing the cast strut and twirl which rescued it from turkey time.
Then again, the behaviour Rosa was called upon to act out tended to send the tone straight back to the realms of the absurd, for example, what was the big problem with Rita? Rico's best friend Ken (the sadly shortlived Rodney Harvey) is about the nicest guy in the picture, but when he finds out Ken has been romancing Rita, Rico goes ballistic as if there were certain unresolved "issues" there about another man dating his sister. Best not to dwell on them, not as much as the movie does at any rate, but then there's Rita's friend Lola (Moon Orona) who he thinks nothing of indulging in steamy salsa with (complete with the glitter ball in his garage - every home should have one) when he's ostensibly going out with Vicki (Angela Alvarado), the girl he's supposed to be partnering for the King of Salsa trophy. There is a routine where Vicki pulls Rico along by his privates later on (?!) but that's supposed to be a bit of fun, though sums up the prickly attitude to character. Still, the dancing...
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| Reviewer: |
Graeme Clark
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