There's a very specific audience that's going to connect with Brandon and Jason Trost's film The FP. Diehard fans of dance-off genre films like Breakin' should have an entry into the world that the Trost Bros. have created here. B-movie geeks, especially those who have embraced Walter Hill's cult classic The Warriors certainly will find something to celebrate, too. Everyone else? Well, it's hard to say how much an uninitiated viewer will enjoy The FP; my expectation is very little.
The film is as much an homage to the aforementioned titles as it is a parody, although the jokes are often muted by the treatment of The FP's world (that's Frazier Park, yo!) as utterly real, even as the characters are (over)burdened by cartoon-ish dialogue and behaviors. There are some truly funny moments scattered throughout the film but one has to be patient and willing to suspend disbelief in order to enjoy them. We're not talking about a work of cinematic art here; this is a faux gang picture set in a preposterous ghetto populated by warriors who settle their arguments with tournaments of "Beat-Beat Revelation," a knock-off of the once popular dance video game "Dance Dance Revolution."
Look for plot references to popular 80s films like the sequels to Rocky (specifically Rocky IV--there's a death to be avenged in an ultimate BBR match) and The Karate Kid as well as from lesser films of the decade. The FP owes a special debt to a particular flavor of dubious cinema, inspiring lines of dialogue as vapid as, "we roll together, we die together," a phrase exchanged several times during the film.
For a film that's just over 80 minutes in length, The FP feels much longer. Based on a short film from 2007, it suffers from more than a small amount of filler to reach that expanded running time. Clearly, the Trost Bros. love the films they're lampooning in The FP. The question is: does anyone else adore those films enough to endure a full-length movie that attempts to insert itself into the pantheon of good/bad cinema.
The FP opens at the Hollywood Theatre on Friday, March 16th. More info available here.
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