Sneakerella Review – Snooze-y Shoe Ad

By Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

Would you want to sit through a 1 hour 50 minutes long shoe ad? Because that’s what the 2022 Disney musical ‘Sneakerella’ feels like. Directed by Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum, the film is a modern Cinderella reboot set in New York.

Just by the trailer, one can guess what’s going to happen, but who doesn’t love the re-telling of popular classics? Actor Chosen Jacobs plays El, a young boy who helps his mean step-father run a sneaker shop that belonged to his late mother. Constantly bullied by his two step-brother, El spends his day slogging at the shop and dreams of designing sneakers. As fate would have it, El’s path crosses with Kira King (Lexi Underwood), the daughter of one of the biggest names in the business, the meeting leads to his own shot at a fairy-tale ending.

‘Sneakerella’ starts off with a fun song titled ‘Kicks’, it’s got a nice 90s retro beat going on and does a fantastic job of establishing El’s passion for sneakers. But after that number, every other track in the film sounds very generic and stock-like, as if taken off from one of those copyright-free sounds available on YouTube for content creators and remixed a little with tailor-made lyrics. They aren’t enjoyable, so I ended up fast-forwarding a bunch of them. Although, there is a fun rap-battle kind of musical face-off in the end, between El and Darius King (John Salley).

What’s weird about the film is that it’s tailored for younger viewers, however, it’s hard to imagine kids being kicked over a bunch of sneakers. Not sure what kind of sponsorship the makers got for name-dropping brands, but the story seems like an excuse to glorify expensive custom-made pair of shoes. The cast does a decent job, Chosen Jacobs sings and dances like he is out of a boy band, but with a poor script, the dancing and singing only slows things down. The climax has a slightly more positive ending than the classic Cinderella tale, but is tooooo long-drawn and tedious.

Overall, it’s just another very forgettable flick. It’s a 4/10 from me. It’s available to stream on Disney Hoststar.