''Cuban Fury'' is a 2014 British

romantic comedy Romantic comedy (also known as romcom or rom-com) is a subgenre of comedy and slice of life fiction, focusing on lighthearted, humorous plot lines centered on romantic ideas, such as how true love is able to surmount most obstacles. In a typica ...

film directed by James Griffiths, written by Jon Brown, and starring

Nick Frost Nicholas Jonathan Frost (born 28 March 1972) is a British actor, author, comedian, painter, producer and screenwriter. He has appeared in the ''Three Flavours Cornetto'' trilogy of films, consisting of ''Shaun of the Dead'' (2004), ''Hot Fuzz ...

Rashida Jones Rashida Leah Jones (; born February 25, 1976) is an American actress. Jones appeared as Louisa Fenn on the Fox drama series ''Boston Public'' (2000–2002), as Karen Filippelli on the NBC comedy series ''The Office'' (2006–2009; 2011), and as ...

and

Chris O'Dowd Christopher O'Dowd (born 9 October 1979) is an Irish actor and comedian. He received wide attention as Roy Trenneman, one of the lead characters in the Channel 4 comedy '' The IT Crowd'', which ran for four series between 2006 and 2010. He has ...

. The film was a minor box office success but received mixed reviews from critics.

Plot

Bruce Garrett, a former teen

salsa Salsa most often refers to: * Salsa (Mexican cuisine), a variety of sauces used as condiments * Salsa music, a popular style of Latin American music * Salsa (dance), a Latin dance associated with Salsa music Salsa or SALSA may also refer to: A ...

champion with his sister Sam, is now an engineer. Bruce gave up dancing after he was brutally bullied and traumatized by older boys on his way to the Nationals final. 25 years later, after Bruce has a meet cute moment with his new American boss, Julia, he hears she is passionate about salsa dancing. So, he decides that the only way he can win her over is by re-mastering the art of dance. He seeks out his old teacher Ron, who forces him to confront the reasons he quit dancing in the first place. Bruce struggles with low self-esteem due to his weight, as well as his constantly bullying coworker and rival, Drew. He continually dominates Julia's attention, a romantic interest for Bruce but strictly sexual for Drew. With the help of his salsa classmates, teacher, and his former dancing partner, his sister Sam, Bruce gets up the courage to relearn all his 'rusty' dance steps and to recapture his lost "corazón" (heart), not only for the dance but for his life. Convinced by his classmate Bejan to go to a salsa club, Bruce is given a mini makeover at home. The transformation includes shaving his chest hair and use a bronzer. At the club there are more people from the class. As Bruce is dancing with his instructor, Ron openly criticize his passionless move. Insensed by the bullying, he geatly improved, but when seeing Drew with Julia on the dance floor is dejected. His salsa friends see the deflated Bruce leaving. Thanks to Ron seeing Bruce at the club, he agrees to train Bruce. Again encouraging him with mild bullying, Ron pushes him hard until he starts to see results. Bruce has a mini dance-off with Drew at their lunch break, giving him a burst of self-confidence. When ready, Bruce's friends convince him to enter the local nightclub's salsa dance competition, with the idea that he'll invite Julia to be his dance partner. But when he goes round to hers to ask her out to the dance, he is tricked into believing that he's interrupting an intimate evening she's spending with Drew, so leaves before asking, disillusioned. Julia, meanwhile, discovers what Drew is up to and outright rejects his advances, then kicks him out whilst threatening his position at work. Julia discovers the salsa mixtape was from him, not Drew so follows Bruce to the nightclub. There he's been doing quite well with Sam and an old routine, and is about to enter the final heat/round of the competition. When he notices Julia had followed him to the club, he's elated and finally plucks up the courage to ask her to dance. They dance the last round of the competition, where Bruce goes on to lose the competition, but regains his true self and finally wins Julia's heart.

Cast

as Bruce Garrett *

as Julia *

as Drew *

Ian McShane Ian David McShane (born 29 September 1942) is an English actor, producer and director. He is known for his television performances, particularly as the title role in the BBC series ''Lovejoy'' (1986–1994), Al Swearengen in '' Deadwood'' (2004 ...

as Ron *

Olivia Colman Sarah Caroline Sinclair ( Colman; born 30 January 1974), known professionally as Olivia Colman, is an English actress. Known for her comedic and dramatic roles in film and television, she has received various accolades, including an Academy A ...

as Sam Garrett *

Wendi McLendon-Covey Wendi McLendon-Covey (née McLendon; born October 10, 1969) is an American actress and comedian. She is known primarily for her work in comedic and improvisational roles. Since 2013, McLendon-Covey has played the role of Beverly Goldberg, a fami ...

as Carly *

Alexandra Roach Alexandra Elizabeth Roach (born 20 August 1987) is a Welsh actress best known for her roles as Becky in ''Utopia'' and DS Joy Freers in ''No Offence''. She has also made appearances in series including '' Being Human'', ''Inside No. 9'', ''Blac ...

as Helen *

Rory Kinnear Rory Michael Kinnear (born 17 February 1978) is an English actor and playwright who has worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Royal National Theatre. In 2014, he won the Olivier Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of William S ...

as Gary *

Kayvan Novak Kayvan Novak ( fa, کیوان نواک; born 23 November 1977) is a British actor and comedian.Kadivar, DariuSyriana breaks Iranian stereotypes, ''Persian Mirror''. Retrieved 3 August 2007. He co-created and starred in the comedy series ''Fone ...

as Bejan *

Simon Pegg Simon John Pegg (né Beckingham; born 14 February 1970) is an English actor, comedian, screenwriter, and producer. He came to prominence in the UK as the co-creator of the Channel 4 sitcom ''Spaced'' (1999–2001), directed by Edgar Wright. H ...

(''cameo'') as Ginger Mondeo driver * Chris Wilson as Chief Executive Officer * The Cuban Brothers as MC's during dance contest

Release

Critical response

The film received mixed reviews from critics. On

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, it has a 54% score based on 96 reviews, with an average rating of 5.54/10. The site's consensus states: "Nick Frost and Chris O'Dowd remain as undeniably likable as ever, but ''Cuban Fury'' saddles them with a contrived and predictable plot that's far too short on laughs."

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

gives a weighted average score of 52 out of 100 rating based on reviews from 21 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Soundtrack

Decca Records Decca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis (Decca), Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934 by Lewis, Jack Kapp, American Decca's first president, and Milton Rackmil, who later became American ...

released the ''Cuban Fury'' soundtrack on 17 February 2014.

References

External links

* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Cuban Fury 2014 films 2010s Persian-language films 2010s French-language films 2014 romantic comedy films British romantic comedy films British dance films Films set in 1987 Films set in 2012 Films shot in London Big Talk Productions films Film4 Productions films StudioCanal films 2010s dance films Films scored by Daniel Pemberton 2014 directorial debut films Films shot at Elstree Film Studios 2010s English-language films 2010s British films 2014 multilingual films British multilingual films