LELE 'UWEHEEEEE!

VIDEO: "Island Girl Dance Fitness Workout: Cardio Hula," (Goldhil, 2004)

STYLE: Hula dance for beginners
INTENSITY: Mild to moderate
STRUCTURE: 35 min. total; 5-min. warm-up and cool-down; 25 minutes cardio/toning through short combinations that introduce and build on basic steps.
GIST: Nice mommy-n-me workout; relaxing; cardio value is mild, but it's great for working on core strength. Major caveat: there's no real explanation of proper technique, which is crucial to getting any good out of this video.

Here's a nice little workout that probably won't change your life, but is perfect for doing with your mom on a weekend visit home, just after pedicure time and right before cocktail hour. 

My mom loves Hawaii -- who doesn't? -- but does not love exercise videos. She prefers clear and present motivation, like a dog to walk or a flesh-and-blood instructor to follow. So on my trip home for Easter, I was interested to see if this "Island Girl" hula workout would float her boat. 

At a compact 35 minutes and devoid of any music that encourages fist-pumping, it got mom on board, but it was grounded heavily enough in the lower abdominals to give me a clear focus and challenge. Nearly every movement is done in a half-squat, with knees bent and center of gravity lowered. Instructor Kili adds deeper pliés and lunges to get the thighs working, but even the simplest movements, such as a side-to-side step, remain in that half-chair pose.

And that's where my main criticism of the video resides: Kili is a nicely laidback instructor, but she does not communicate the importance of posture and technique in keeping that basic pose, which is the foundation for practically every movement in the video. She should have explained how to brace the pelvic floor and lower abs while keeping the chest lifted, rather than simply bending one's knees. My mom, who's not as familiar with core training, said she had mild shin splints by the end of the video, because she was transferring her weight toward the front onto her knees, rather than back and down, into her heels and pelvic floor. A thorough explanation of the proper technique at the beginning of the workout could have helped prevent that from happening.

With that said, though, this video is enjoyable and incredibly relaxing. It has a serene, gorgeous setting and gentle music that's neither intrusive nor boring. Add to that a refrain of core-powered hip swaying, which instructor Kili describes quite literally as "the motion of the ocean," and it's the closest you can come to napping in a hammock while working out.

The movements are all fairly simple, such as mildly stylized torso twists and tendus, but a couple were tricky enough to send me and my mom giggling at our efforts -- namely, lele 'uwehe, a combination of a tendu and a twerk that Kili seemed to relish cuing with a gleeful "Lele 'uweheeee!" (That's definitely not as fun to read or write than it is to say out loud, so you'll have to try it on your own.)

By the end of the video, I felt warm and glowy and firmed-up in the tummy. My mom felt worked-out and ready for a shower and a margarita. Did Island Girl change her opinion of workout videos? Not much, she said, but that's ok -- I'm interested enough for the both of us. 

How do you solve a problem like Dolphina?

VIDEO: "Goddess Workout: Introduction to Bellydance" (GoddessLife, 1998)
STYLE: Belly dance
INTENSITY: Low
STRUCTURE: Warm-up, 8 min.; heads, hands and arms, 5 min.; hips, 7 min.; shoulders and chest, 6 min.; hip circles, 5 min.; undulations and snakes, 4 min.; shimmies, 3 min.; routine, 4 min.; cool-down, 3 min.
GIST: A hot mess of bad camera work, mediocre instruction, titty fixation and half-baked Eastern religion -- but with killer outfits and a presenter who means well.

You know what Southern women would say about Dolphina? They'd say, "Bless her heart," and it'd be just as simultaneously backhanded and sympathetic as it sounds.

You see, Dolphina -- can you guess what her spirit animal* is?? -- wants to help you unleash your goddess within; but she and the creepers behind this video are too enraptured with the goddess on screen to really help the budding belly dancer at home. Whether intentional or not, it's all about her -- her truly marvelous body, her devilish grins, her fantastic costumes, her affectations of worldly mystique and sexual power, her exotic sets. Choreography, instruction and viewer comprehension come second -- not always, but far too often.

Add this to the ever-expanding Laws of Fitness Presenters (and life?): It's hard to be too beautiful or too fit, but it's easy to seem too into yourself. Really, the issue comes down to what makes it on camera. In your own mind, you can think the tides move with the slope of your torso, but you can't let that show in your work. That's just common sense. You're there to instruct, inspire and entertain all the poor suffering blobs at home. Not eyefuck yourself through the camera.

And sweet Jesus, does Dolphina love eyefuckin'. Observe:

Minnie Mouse goes to Rio

VIDEO: "Dance and Be Fit: Carnaval," (Acacia, 2010)

STYLE: Dance aerobics

INTENSITY: Overall, moderate to somewhat heavy, but can be scaled up or down by the viewer

STRUCTURE: Warm-up, 5 minutes; three cardio segments, 12 minutes each; cool-down, 5 minutes

GIST: Very nearly derailed by awful cuing, but too much fun and too good a cardio workout to not try

So, as promised, I'm gearing up for Mardi Gras by checking out Carnival-themed workouts, and because it's available streaming on Hulu (score!), I started with this offering from the "Dance and Be Fit" series:

If it looks kinda corny, well, it is! Corny-cool. Presenter Kimberly Miguel Mullen is -- sorry, Kimberlys of the world -- very much a Kimberly. She's got an ever-present cheerleader smile and a high-pitched peppy voice that prompted my dad, who was within earshot as I did this video at my parents' house, to ask, "Are you working out with Minnie Mouse?"

But Kimberly brought the goods. I got loose. I laughed frequently. I got sweaty and pumped up, which inspired me to keep pushing and do everything full-out for maximum effect. And, with 36 minutes of continuous cardio (minus the short commercial breaks on the Hulu version), it was good enough for a Saturday's work. Silly + sweaty works for me, especially with moves like these:

Isolated hip circles and pelvic pops with arms outstretched. Great, effective warm-up.  

Running and blasting into a side-kick. "EXPLOOOODE!" Kimberly says. 

I felt these explosions in my butt the next morning.

Tracy Anderson's no-fun middle school sleepover workout

VIDEO: "Tracy Anderson Beginner Dance Cardio" (Bubi and Babe Exercise Inc., 2010)
STYLE: Dance aerobics
INTENSITY: Moderate
STRUCTURE: Intro; short warm-up; four routines in 10- to 15-minute sections; cool-down
GIST: The routines themselves are pretty good, but they're undermined in so many dazzling ways, from chintzy production values to Tracy's own blandness, that all I can only summarize thusly: It sucks.

Remember in 6th grade, when you and your friends would have sleepovers and eat pizza and bake brownies and watch Romeo + Juliet for the 46th time, and at some point someone would be like, "OMG guys, let's make up a dance and record it like a real music video!" And you'd put on Ace of Base or the Now and Then soundtrack and get maybe 16 counts down before the whole thing dissolved into hastily-flung criticisms, arguments and tears?

Well, if a) y'all had actually finished the video, and b) you'd shot it in a Pilates studio with someone's overconfident boyfriend operating the camera, it would look more or less like "Tracy Anderson Beginner Dance Cardio."

This is for a British version of the U.S. videos, but it's the same footage. 
The fact that this title is currently out of print in the U.S. yet only 2 years old is telling.

This video could have been good, but it's not. As a trainer to GOOPy Gwyneth Paltrow, shimmying Shakira and ever-calcifying Madonna, Tracy Anderson had some serious blonde buzz behind her with  this video. (Both Gwynny and Shakira talk sugar about her on the video jacket.) But apparently that wasn't enough to get Anderson a decent production budget, because it's put together with as much craftsmanship as my Stay Awake-fueled PowerPoint presentations from freshman year of college. Specifically, I'm talkin bout:

The curious, shiny case of Deanne Berry

VIDEO: "Clubland Work It Out," (2008, Universal Pictures UK)
STYLE: Dance aerobics, dance, kickboxing and toning
INTENSITY: Moderate to difficult
STRUCTURE: 10-minute warm-up; 15 minutes of aerobics; 15-minute dance routine; 15 minutes of kickboxing; 15 minutes of floor exercises; 12-minute cool-down. About 80 minutes total.
GIST: I LOVE THIS WORKOUT. That's it. But it's not available for purchase in the U.S. Wah wah.*

See this creature? Is she the second coming of Xanadu-vintage Olivia Newton-John? A Barbie brought to life?

This, friends, is Deanne Berry, the queen of Clubland. She's a supernova of the sassosphere who burned bright for several thrilling years in the mid- to late-aughts and, after some TV spots and an ill-fated attempt at a recording career, all but disappeared. Where she now roams nobody knows. Intrigue!

Today we're going to be talking about "Clubland Work It Out," which is, in my opinion, Deanne's most solid effort. Like all the Clubland videos, it's not available for purchase in the U.S. *If you buy it off Amazon.co.uk, it won't work on most American DVD players or computers, because it's coded with a different "region." There are ways around this, but they're long and maddening. I don't think I can legally tell you to download it from a file sharing site, but if you don't know how to download it from a file sharing site, you can find most of the workout in the links I provide below.

Ready? Ok!

Like Aphrodite rising from the foam of severed testes cast into the sea, she burst onto the scene a fully-formed workout goddess -- or at least she played one convincingly in the shamelessly lubed-up video for Eric Prydz's "Call On Me."

The video was a crazy gigantic hit across the pond -- one interviewer in a TV spot says she "captured the imagination of the country" -- and even though Berry was just a dancer, not an aerobics instructor, the UK music label Ministry of Sound invited her to host the next in their series of "Pump It Up!" workout videos. THIS IS WHAT DREAMS ARE MADE OF, FOLKS.

So she rustled up some fitness certifications and did just that, bringing her Aussie looks (slammin tanned bod, toothy smile) and dancer's nuance (so much sassy hair-flipping!) to the workout video world. After another title with "Ministry of Sound," she jumped ship and moved over to Clubland, yet another UK house music label with a stake in the fitness video market. (WHY DON'T WE DO THIS IN AMERICA???)

That brings us to "Clubland Work It Out," a dizzyingly ludicrous display of quality dance aerobics, music video fantasizing and a whole lotta ass-cheek. Exhibit A (har har):

Ballet porn? Not exactly.

VIDEO: "New York City Ballet Workout Vol. 2"

STYLE: Ballet-inspired stretches, resistance exercises and standing barre exercises, plus a bit of aerobics

INTENSITY: Light to moderate

STRUCTURE: Three short warm-up segments; 25 minutes of resistance exercises; just under 20 minutes of barre exercises; short cool-down; tacked-on aerobic section at the end.

GIST: A lovely workout, though uneven in pacing and structure. Gorgeous classical music is the biggest star here. The dancers are beautiful but blank; the production values are top-notch, with moody lighting and a sleek look. The exercises are geared toward strength training and some ballet basics, but for aspiring dancers, it can't replace a real class. 

Balletophiles are kind of creepy, and I say that as one of them.

We love ballet for the art itself, yes, but dance is the one art that uses the human body as its sole tool, and that leads to a definite creep factor in the envy, fascination, awe and delight that ballet fans take in examining dancers' bodies. If you're just as happy watching dancers at their daily barre work as in a performance, (or needed some private time after watching Baryshnikov in "The Turning Point"), you know what I mean. 

The "New York City Ballet Workout" series (there's just two of them) is a feast for ballet creepers in its wonderfully lit, sleekly produced style -- all those bods! -- but you don't need to be a huge ballet fan to enjoy it as a workout. In fact, too much ballet envy could hinder your "NYCB Workout" experience, because this is a basic, ballet-inspired workout first and an Angelina Ballerina escapade second. You have to actually, you know, work. Not just practice your port de bras and do some wobbly pirouettes in the mirror. (Not that I ever do that, of course.)

Meh days, brisk walks and Crunch "CardioSculpt"

VIDEO: "CardioSculpt," from the Crunch series, available on Netflix instant streaming
STYLE: Circuit training-style combo of light aerobics and quality dumbbell exercises
INTENSITY: For beginners, moderate to intense. For intermediate and up, light to moderate.
STRUCTURE: Just over 30 minutes total; brisk 4-minute warm-up; 20 minutes alternating aerobic and weights exercises; 4 minutes floor exercises; 3-minute cool-down.
GIST: A pretty solid 30-minute workout that gets your heart rate up, but focuses more on an all-over tone than serious cardio work. Interesting variations on classic exercises make the workout challenging and semi-fresh even for more advanced folks. The cardio exercises are so-so, and the look and feel is definitely same-old, same-old.

Some days are going to be sloggy. Meh. Comme ci, comme ca. The usual. Not every day can be brazzle-dazzle, dancing on a lighthouse with Helen Reddy and wearing amazing sailor pants. But a meh day is better than a terrible, awful, no-good day, right? And looking back, you realize it wasn't that meh at all, because it was just another day of wins and losses, ups and downs -- another day of being alive.

Sometimes, circumstances -- misplaced your fave videos, tired of your workout routine and needing something new in a pinch, just generally feeling pissy, etc. -- require us to do the more "meh" workout, because it's better than no workout. More important, it can save us from slipping into "Whatever, I'm getting cheese fries" regression. Or worse, (unless you're the Fat Boys).

Streaming Sass & "The Situation Workout"

I learned a few important things today.

1. Netflix has a modest but decent library of fitness videos available on instant streaming. This is marvelous news! They're culled mostly from the Crunch, 10 Minute Solutions and Dance Off the Inches series, with a few randos thrown in. Which leads me to...

2. Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino of "Jersey Shore" shadenfame has a workout video. Of course he does. It promises to give you "the recipe for your own Situation" and features two vaguely guidette-ish chicks, along with Mike's meathead bestie from the block, dubbed The Unit. (Why "The Unit"? Says he: "You don't choose the nickname; the nickname choose you.") As for the chicks' nicknames, they get to share the generic, maddening "sweetheart," along with douchey molestations from "the man, the myth, the legend" himself.

The Unit, at your service.

The only workout that includes special instruction in sexual harassment!

3. Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino has a fairly decent workout video. I would never do it for real because of reasons already stated and further elaborated below, but in terms of the actual workout, I can't find too much to hate on. It consists of five 10-minute circuit-training segments, each of them a combination of dumbbell exercises and "active rest" aerobics. The whole workout, about an hour long, amounts to P90X: "Jersey Shore" Edition.

For some, that's not only tolerable; it's a selling point. For me, not even an ironic fan of that Music Television programme, I'd rather suffer the private humiliation of the entire "Dance the Chakras Yoga Workout" than listen to Signore Situation opine on himself, his haters and women, (but mostly himself).

"I'm not too good with this one."

VIDEO: "The Jordan Workout," (2 Entertain Video, 2005). Note: This video is only available for purchase in the UK, but the entire thing is on YouTube in six segments. See the video embedded below to get started.)
STYLE: Light cardio kickboxing and standing/floor exercises
INTENSITY: Light
STRUCTURE: Warmup; 15-minute cardio kickboxing segment; 15-minute standing exercise segment; 15-minute floor exercise segment; cool-down
GIST: This isn't a fully realized workout, so don't do it except for a laugh, (total fitness beginners who are also fans of Katie Price excluded).

I was going to cover "The Jordan Workout" as a fun little trifle, then got sucked into hostess/workout slacker Katie Price's whole orbit, then did the entire workout and took notes in order to review it for real, then realized how crappy the workout is and am now writing about it a fun little trifle, but for real. This is the Holly Golightly of workout videos: She's phony; she's real; she's a real phony.

Let me explain. Have you never heard of Katie Price? No? Then you probably don't live in the UK. If you did, you'd know all about this girl's start as a topless model, time as a reality star and political candidate, series of best-selling novels and autobiographies, string of relationships with soccer stars, impregnation by some soccer star, marriage to musician Peter Andre, divorce from Peter Andre, series of children's books called "My Perfect Ponies," marriage to some other dude, divorce from some other dude, and all-around tabloid chumness. (I don't live in the UK. I got all of the above from Wikipedia and my Scottish roommate.)

So why's it called "The Jordan Workout"? Well, Ms. Price went by the single-name Jordan during her early glamour girl days, and still keeps the name around in a Sasha Fierce kind of way. (Both Katie and Jordan, however, seem pretty lame compared to her given name: Katrina Amy Alexandria Alexis Infield. Dayum, that's like an entire litter of Bratz dolls.)

So, the workout: Katie is the first to admit that she's just there for decoration and moral support -- not, like, peppy encouragement, but rather cheerfully whiny empathy. As Katie explains, in her blasé I-just-popped-a-Xanny delivery, she'd "never ever exercised or dieted in her whole life." But after giving birth and getting ready to get married -- "the two major events in a girl's life" -- she called in the big guns to help her "get back in my G-string in record time."

Enter Richard, who seems game and as surprised as anyone to be doing the heavy lifting for Katie in her Barbie Dream House workout world. (The set, a compact cesspool of pink, goes over the top -- I'm looking at you, high heel chair -- yet makes perfect sense.) Richard introduces himself as "the best fitness trainer in the world, apparently." 

Richard is the kind but tough instructor; Katie is the charmingly bratty pupil, a proxy for her target audience at home. Together, they have a disarming screwball chemistry that makes the decent parts of the workout better.