Korean dance movie Innocent Steps is as much about love as it is about dancing. The film starts off as any other Korean arranged-marriage romance. This time it's an innocent village girl from China who marries a South Korean man she has never met in an attempt to start a new life.
But director Park Young-hoon turns an all-too-familiar storyline into an insightful look at love.
In the scene in which Young-sae (Park Gun-hyung) - once Korea's greatest dancer - prepares his new dance partner and wife Chae-ryn (Moon Geun-young) for a national competition, he asks the young girl to fall in love with him.
'Remember and follow the rhythm of my heart,' he says. And by doing so, Chae-ryn - originally a clumsy dancer - evolves into a graceful dancing champion.
Park Young-hoon clearly knows something about dancing and relationships: you will never succeed unless you are on the same wavelength as your partner.
The movie's best scenes are the intimate tutorial sessions in which Young-sae teaches Chae-ryn the passionate moves of the samba. They train and live together and, eventually, fall for each other. This development, although predictable, is portrayed naturally and convincingly.