This movie could not look any more dated had the editor subtitled every frame with "Made in 1984". Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo will live on forever, though, if only for the incredible title that it boasts, one that has been parodied over the years to the point where even doing that now feels dated.
Luckily, the wild success of the original "Breakin'" only seven months earlier didn't go to the heads of our three lead characters, who all returned for the sequel. For those not in the know, they are Kelly, the rich white girl who got in touch with her breakdancing self and joined up with two buddies, the ethnic working-class chip-on-his-shoulder Ozone (the guy, not the gas) and sidekick Turbo. No, this isn't an animated film from Japan. Anyway, in the first film, they won a Flashdance-style dance competition over some bitchy ballet-dancing guy, Kelly began to develop some sort of G-rated relationship with Ozone, and all was well. It wasn't Singin' in the Rain, but was passable enough for the genre.
Now lets do a casual roll-call of the talent present for this epic: It may be worth noting that the actors playing Kelly and Ozone are no strangers to awful movies; Kelly was a 'girl greaser' in Grease 2, and Ozone was a backup dancer in Xanadu. Rapper-turned-actor Ice-T, who has a threatening filmography of his own (Johnny Mnemonic, Final Voyage, Leprechaun in the Hood), plays a supporting role. Director Sam Firstenberg's directing credits include two Delta Force films (but not the, ahem… 'good' ones), Cyborg Cop I and II, and four films with the word "ninja" in the title. The two screenwriters, Jan Ventura and Julie Reichert, have no other writing credits before or after this film. What's more, this film is a Cannon production, maybe the biggest cheesy movie company of the eighties while led by Menahem Golan and his cousin Yoram Globus. Now if all that information doesn't get you all pumped to watch this movie, nothing will.
The MGM lion roars then fades out to preserve his dignity. Now a pause that is the definition of the word 'trepidation'. That infectious (like a disease) synth-pop music that all of us born between 1965 and 1980 were forced to grow up with starts playing. We see random shots of people's feet moving and colorful boom-boxes as the spray-painted credits roll. The story begins in earnest as we see Kelly dancing in some can-can style show that would have been outdated even in the 1940's. The show ends and some guy talks to her and exposits that this was the final performance and Kelly's future is back up in the air.
She returns to her parents' impressive mansion, her parents being super-wealthy in this movie too. Of course, this being a film from the eighties, you can already tell before seeing him that Dad is going to be an uptight, arrogant prick of a guy. I think this was a union rule until 1989, when Batman made it okay to cheer for rich white guys again. We see Dad in the backyard having a drink and relaxing despite the fact he's still got a tightly-wound business suit on. This is to clue in the audience, who otherwise might not surmise he's a rich blowhard. He wants Kelly to give up on the dancing and go to Princeton. He then bitches about how Kelly broke up with Derek, some wealthy lawyer that Dad seemed to like. Dad then takes solace, stating that at least she's not "…with those street people…". By "street people" he doesn't quite mean jackhammer operators and hot dog vendors. Of course, if Dad actually used a racial slur, his character would have no shot at redeeming himself at the end of the story (oops, sorry to spoil it).
Frustrated Kelly runs into the house to cool off. She picks up a framed picture of herself smiling with Ozone and Turbo, reminiscing about those wonderful halcyon days a few months back. We now go to the present-day Ozone and Turbo, who are busy cleaning up around their colorful, graffiti-painted shack. Their wardrobe remains similar to that seen in the first "Breakin'", consisting of lots of zippered leather run over by a lawn mower. Nearby, all sorts of teens and young kids play and dance while we notice every object in sight is freakishly-colorful. Its like being both participant and observer of a neighborhood napalmed with magic mushrooms. Kelly pulls up and greets Ozone with a romantic kiss, so I guess they still have a relationship of some kind. Both Breakin' films were as vague as a condom commercial regarding interracial romance as if the filmmakers were terrified about turning away all those KKK-affiliated breakdancing fans .
Ozone beckons all the kids to gather 'round. Unfortunately he doesn't hand out doses of Ritalin but instead leads them in dance as the vapid and cringe-inducing '80's synth-pop picks up. As if things couldn't get any worse, the little kids begin rapping. The scene soon turns into a mob of dozens of rapping, dancing, jumping kids in colorful clothes. It's like a precursor to the L.A. riots a few years later, only with none of the dancers, unfortunately, getting slapped in the face with bricks.
We watch a mailman breakdancing. Great, finally we have a setting where a rampaging uzi-wielding mailman would come in handy but he chooses to breakdance instead. A power-company worker up on a pole starts gyrating while I grab a towel to wipe the blood from my eyes. Gardeners jump out from behind bushes and dance. Construction workers perform that 'slap away the bees' style dance made famous by Rerun on What's Happening? The mob runs through the streets like the hungry zombies from 28 Days Later, only this mob dishes out greater horrors.
The dancing kids from hell make their way into a park where even more of Satan's minions dance on a stage. Too bad this film takes place in L.A. rather than Philadelphia, where the kids that ruined Rocky's jogging scene in Rocky II could've met them and things could've turned into a bloody gang war of attrition. While at the park, Turbo the sidekick takes notice of a young Hispanic-looking girl as she smiles and dances on stage. Some terribly out-of-place dancing fat guy tells Turbo the girl likes him. Turbo dances and smiles at her, then leaves. Don't know what the point of that was since he didn't even bother to utter a word to her but I should just be thankful that this musical assault on my eyes and ears is finally over.
Kelly, Ozone and Turbo wander over to a big, colorful old building in the neighborhood. Ozone points out that this the 'Miracles' community center where he and Turbo help out and teach (Good God, I hope its just dancing and not fashion or hairdressing). Ozone explains the community center is there to serve as a second home to underprivileged kids and teens who have no where else to go. They're supposedly not orphans, but never in the film will we see any of their parents. What parents they do have must not care terribly much, since they let the kids roam the streets and dance on a daily basis but I have a feeling I'm not supposed to think too deeply about this. Oddly, 'Miracles' hasn't devolved into a combination drug den, whorehouse, and gang fort like 99.9% of all other community centers in history.
