FAME — ★★ — Kay Panabaker, Naturi Naughton, Asher Book; rated PG (vulgarity, profanity, slurs, brief sex, brief drugs); in general release.
If only the remake of/sequel to "Fame" had even a tenth of the energy of, say, the like-minded "High School Musical" movies.
If only it had a tenth of those films' sense of fun or their sense of humor. If only it had a sense of humor at all …
But strangely, this updated take on the original 1980 movie musical and the subsequent, short-lived television series of the same name is played almost entirely straight-faced.
And unfortunately, this material is so familiar, so predictable and so cliched that it's hard not to laugh at it. While there are a few select highlights, it's nothing new and is certainly nothing exceptional or noteworthy.
(As such, it bears a strong resemblance to more urbanized, recent dance dramas like the equally groan-worthy "Step Up" movies.)
Like the first film, this drama looks at a handful of young dancers, performers and musicians who are hoping to get into the prestigious New York Academy for the Performing Arts. It follows them from the early audition process through the course of four years' worth of arts and academic studies.
Among those who do make the first cut — thousands are trimmed to only a couple of hundred — are the painfully shy, would-be actress Jenny (Kay Panabaker); Denise (Naturi Naughton), a classical pianist who wants to perform other styles and sing; and singing prodigy Marco (Asher Book).
Their teachers include specialists in music (Megan Mullally and Kelsey Grammer), dancing (Bebe Neuwirth) and acting (Charles S. Dutton). And none of them will settle for half-hearted efforts or slacking by the students.
At times, director Kevin Tancharoen (TV's "Dancelife") seems obsessed with showing all kinds of fluids being splattered around. (For instance, did we really need to see a trombone player empty his spit valve onscreen?)
Tancharoen and screenwriter Allison Burnett ("Feast of Love") also concentrate too much on bland, white-bread leads Panabaker and Book.
We'd really rather they followed Naughton's conflicted but considerably more interesting Denise; as well as her classmates Malik (Collins Pennie), an inner-city teen who is trying to make it as either an actor or a hip-hop artist; and the musically talented Victor (Walter Perez).
By the way, one character from the first movie does make a return appearance. Lydia Simms, played by Debbie Allen, is now the principal of the school.
That's not her only contribution to the film, though. The overblown, final song-and-dance number obviously had some involvement by Allen as choreographer. Those ridiculous Oscar telecast production numbers that she choreographed had nothing on this silliness.
"Fame" is rated PG and features some suggestive language and references, some lewd dance moves, scattered strong profanity, derogatory language and slurs, brief sexual contact, and brief drug references (heard in song lyrics). Running time: 107 minutes.
e-mail: jeff@desnews.com