The Sailor's movie meanderings: Cuban Fury

Last week, The Sailor's Grandma was visiting, so we took her to Cuban Fury.

It's a familiar plot line.  Underdog Bruce (overweight, middle-aged, single guy) can't get a girlfriend, and must rediscover his talent for Salsa dancing in order to do so.  It's not spoiling the movie to say that he does.

The comedy is in how he gets there, complete with nasty dance teacher, a Will Ferrell-lookalike and act-alike asshole boss who also wants the affections of this girl and will stop at nothing to thwart Bruce's attempts at romance, a gay Middle Eastern salsa-dancer (he has the best lines), and mates and family to cheer Bruce on.

The Sailor's quite keen on a bit of music and dance, often insisting on both to get to sleep, so it's no surprise he enjoyed this movie.  First he managed to do one of those outfit-ruining sharts, but this time the lack of subtitles meant changing him in the dark was not so difficult.  He then settled in for a nap to wait for the real music and dance to start.

There are a fair few laugh-out-loud moments here, as well as a bit of cute thrown in.  The writers and directors of Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead are onto a winning formula with that awkward British The Office-style humour and a bit of slapstick thrown in for good measure.  With both British and American humour types covered, the film will have broad appeal.

It's unlikely to win any awards, but I recommend it for an outing with your mother-in-law.  Funny, a bit crass, and feel-good.  And the music was so toe-tappingly good that The Sailor, upon waking from his nap, insisted I get up and dance with him for the last half hour.  I would have preferred to stay seated, but he insisted, reasoning that I needed to start working on that baby flab.  More on that crusade later.

Rating: *** (worth leaving the house for)