I never saw the original Footloose movie from 1984, but the story told in Footloose the Remake (2011) is pure rubbish.  It rattles along indecorously and, in spite of everything, it’s dated.  Yet filmmaker Craig Brewer concentrates on it as carefully as he does the dancing.  Big mistake.

Even so, at least the dancing doesn’t get shortchanged.  The music does.  Both “Let’s Hear It for the Boy” and a forceful White Stripes song get lost in the narrative balderdash.  Footloose should have been more of a musical and less of a drama.

The movie stars Kenny Wormald (Ren) and Julianne Hough (Ariel).  Ren is a teenaged know-it-all, Ariel knows nothing except how to have fun.  I wish to have no truck with either of them.