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The seemingly superfluous third installment in the Step Up trilogy of dance movies, Step Up 3D (yes, in 3D) follows where Step Up 2 should have ended.

Like its predecessor, there’s a lot of dancing, misplaced attitude and the same hackneyed portrayals of youthful rebellion, set to a fun yet wildly obnoxious soundtrack. The result is a gimmicky but surprisingly entertaining journey on the road to nowhere.

Depending on your level of ironic sensibility, Step Up 3D could either be this season’s most unintentionally magnificent farce, or an excruciating 98 minutes of your life you will never get back.

In most dance films, the dance battle offers an uncanny alternative to traditional methods of dispute resolution. Step Up 3D, directed by Jon Chu, sticks to this tried-and-tested formula with its comic depictions of internecine warfare between feuding dance battalions. (In the film, we get ludicrous names for the gangs such as House of Pirates and House of Samurai).

Another common trope in these dance flicks is the use of dance space as a symbol of community activism — a center of resistance against the insidious cycle of laissez-faire capitalism. In Step Up 3D, this center is epitomized in The Vault, a New York City loft where the disenfranchised refugees of the dance world — shunned by their parents and society — are free to shimmy with impunity from the traditional nemeses of the urban arts, which typically include squares such as the cops, old people or the middle class.

Step Up 3D revolves around Step Up 2’s main protagonist, Moose (Adam Sevani), who is now an engineering major at New York University. Somewhat predictably, he becomes an unwilling slave to the rhythm after accidentally scuffing the shoes of a member of a rival dance troupe.

Moose’s fresh moves are exactly what Luke (Rick Malambri) — leader of the House of Pirates — needs to stave off the foreclosure of his warehouse, aptly named The Vault. Apparently the only way for Luke to avoid foreclosure is for the House of Pirates to win a series of superbly choreographed underground dance-offs, in which different crews are pitted against each other in sudden-death dance duels.
No one knows how this works in practice, as the basic mechanics of finance or the transparency of the judging process are never touched upon in the film. But it hardly matters, since you’ll be distracted by either the constant procession of lithe limbs or the saccharine, soap opera-style drama, which somehow manages to hold this tacky yet wondrous mess together.

And there is plenty of drama in Step Up 3D, most of which is facile and unintentionally humorous. Moose has an ongoing quest to prove to his parents that breakdancing is just as legitimate a career as engineering.

He seems blithely unaware that his best friend Camille (Alyson Stoner) is in love with him, despite some uncomfortably long glances. Meanwhile, Luke not only struggles with his dream of making documentaries but with his enslavement to throbbing, restrictive idealism.

There’s also the archetypal bad boy, Julien (Joe Slaughter), a trust-fund baby who wants to shatter everyone’s dreams. Will the “good” guys win? Will there be a budding romance? Will there be another sequel? Your questions will be answered in the dance battle!

That said, it’s just as well the dancing is good. If nothing else, the choreography is flawlessly executed, which makes up for the unbelievably flat acting. Most surprising is that the 3D element — despite being an overt gimmick — is the film’s saving grace.

Step Up 3D was shot entirely in 3D (rather than converted in post-production) and it accentuates the single best feature of the film: the dancing. But to be honest, even referring to Step Up 3D as a “movie” seems overly generous.

It isn’t so much a film as it is a 98-minute music video, where the characters gyrate (or in hip-hop parlance: pop, lock and drop) to a soundtrack of B-grade hip-hop. Step Up 3D ignores the cinematic conventions of plot, dialogue and character development altogether, although there are occasional lapses when the director has decided that he should stick to the flimsy pretense of Step Up 3D being an actual film.

Dramatic storylines aside, the ham-fisted dialogue — which includes solemn declarations such as “Welcome to my house: the House of Pirates” and “If dance is our weapon, then this [referring to their limited edition Nike Gun Metal Dunks] is our armor” — is indicative that the characters should shut up and stick to dancing. Please.

As Step Up 3D is all about hip-hop and territorial conquest, one can expect gratuitous shots of muscles, defiant gesticulation and seemingly injurious crotch-grabs in places of contested sovereignty, like a nightclub or dank New York alleyway.

The pulsing soundtrack of chart favorites featuring the likes of Flo Rida, David Guetta, Santogold and T-Pain is bound to impress the film’s target audience, which presumably consists of teenage girls.

Like all traditional dance narratives, Step Up 3D includes a predictable denouement, when all parties undergo emotional growth in an over-choreographed final spectacle, complete with intricate laser show and epileptic strobe lighting.

Step Up 3D won’t draw you in with its labored exploration into how to express one’s nascent adult identity, but by waving something shiny in your face. Sometimes, that’s all we really need.