“I had this plan,” says voice of Raya Green (Rutina Wesley) as How She Move begins. “Study hard in private school, study hard in Med school, and make everyone proud.”

But as we all well know, life doesn’t always turn out as we expect. The plans we make are rarely the only way to get to where we need to go. And more often than not, the very things we see as our most important destinations turn out to be only a small part of the puzzle.

For Raya Green, her destination is Medical School. Her logic: get as far away from the urban neighborhood in which she grew up and prove that she is more than where she was born. And her plan: get out now so she can actually get what she needs to stay out forever. But then, Raya’s sister Pam dies. The addiction that took Pam’s life leaves Raya and her family without the money that had been putting Raya through school. And so, with no other choice, Raya returns to the urban neighborhood and school she left long ago.

But as Raya will tell anyone who asks her, she’s busy making sure she can get right back out as soon as she can. A week after her sister’s funeral, she will take a test to get back into private school. If she is ever going to succeed, she must get back there. If she is ever going to make anyone proud, she must get out of here. If she is ever going to get anywhere, she must make it happen herself.

But the question is, when she doesn’t do as well on her test as she had hoped, what does she do now? And the closest answer: enter a step competition with her friends to win the money she needs.

In many ways, How She Move is like other dance and performance movies before it. It begins with a tragic event that somehow derails the main character’s ability to pursue his or her dream. It is interspersed with both self-doubt and issues of loyalty and cooperation between creative team members. It will end with a performance on which the leading character rests his or her future. And in the pursuit of the final performance, there will be those who see the particular mode of creative expression to be a waste of time, a frivolous pursuit, and sometimes even a dangerous activity. But the thing that is different about How She Move is that for much of the movie, Raya is actually one of those people also.

For Raya, dance is just a necessary part of her plan. She is good at it. And there moments where her smile betrays how much she enjoys what she is doing. But like the tutoring she gives her childhood friend Michelle (Tre Armstrong), for every moment of sincerity and interest, there are five that point right back to her real goal—getting back on the path she has for herself.

As a fellow dancer puts it, her steps aren’t just want-to-win steps, they are need-to-win steps. When teamwork isn’t working, she tries to do it all herself. When things fall apart on the first team she joins, she accepts a spot on their rival’s team. And even though we still see that smile of enjoyment every once in a while, there is the sense that all is just business. And the dancing—just a means to an end and a pursuit that will never matter at all in and of itself.

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