Glitter

Okay, for the record, this was a lousy film. But did it deserve the sort of bombastic universal panning it received? It was not nearly in the league of such absolute bombs as Gigli, Black Dog or anything with Rutger Hauer. It was a formulaic, wish-fulfillment movie worthy of being a Lifetime Special or an ABC Movie of the Week. It sucked, but it wasn't the sort of movie that scars one for life. After all the jokes and hype I was disappointed when I saw this movie on cable this weekend. I was expecting Ishtar. To me, this points up a problem with how our culture reviews movies. Every so often critics, (who are cynical bastards anyway) seem to pick out a movie to practice witty cruelty upon as a sort of mental exercise. Poor Glitter, and poor Mariah, who had a nervous breakdown over how this movie was received by the critical establishment!

CURIUOSITY! ...Said to Myself Mariah Carey!?!?!? Hmmmm ..... I wonder if she can act???

So ...Can You GUESS??? Probably pretty easy to imagine...HUH!?!? O. K.... Now, take Your Imagination DOWN a few notches... And just MAYBE You have guessed it more or less for what it is! ...Or in this case.... What it is NOT!

Probably MY BAD! Usually, I avoid bad movies like the PLAGUE! Well... The EXCEPTION PROVES the RULE! The very BEST I can say about this FILM?????? Well.... Some of the MUSICAL NUMBERS were.... NOT SO BAD! And ...as is the Case with almost EVERY rather bloated Budget Hollywood production... ALL Those standard PRODUCTION VALUES.... You know... Cimemaphotography, editing, sets, costumes, recording and sound engineering etc..... as expected... were all.... Well.... ACCEPTABLE!

The storyline, however, was utterly inane. Deciding not to submit myself to anymore CRUEL + UNUSUAL Punishment... I just had to pull the plug about 1/2 way thru! SORRY!

Need I say anymore??? O. K.... I thought You would agree!

FYI... This REVIEW has like 700 or 800 Characters! Much more than 150 MINIMUM.... RIGHT!?!?!?

In my perverse desire to see every film in the bottom 100, I thought I could not go far wrong with a rental of this classic POS. Mariah Carey's first and so far only feature film is an example of how the combined MPAA and RIAA attempts to shovel garbage at us are starting to backfire. Sales of Mariah's recordings, once one of the highlights of an otherwise dreary RIAA mainstream catalogue, have slumped. It's all because of this film. Don't let the blind Mariah fans fool you - it is just as bad as critics say, and deserving of its bottom 100 status.

Where to begin when pulling apart this cinematic abortion? For me, the first major problem was the cinematography. If the viewer is not clued in on the fact that Vondie Curtis-Hall has only directed television before this film as it starts, the flat, Days-Of-Our-Lives-style shots will soon make it clear enough. Directors who put one or two actors, three tops, in a 2.35:1 frame are a dime a dozen. On the other hand, directors who cannot even differentiate these actors' spacing from the camera truly stand out, and not in a good way.

The story has been described as being syrupy enough to kill anyone who suffers from diabetes (or doesn't), and I am not going to contest that. It's a variation upon the classic rags to riches theme, specifically tailored towards Mariah. Mariah essentially plays herself in the guise of a young vocalist who starts singing backup for a considerably less talented vocalist. As she crosses the paths of more people, eventually said people twig to the fact that she can vocalise with the best of them. One DJ eventually picks her up, manages her through a record deal, and promises her that one day she *will* play in Madison Square Garden, or something along those lines.

This kind of story has been done before, with such real-life examples as the Jacksons providing source material for one excellent miniseries of the theme. The problem here is that we've heard this story a million times before. Another significant problem is that while Mariah has a voice many would kill for, there is absolutely nothing that stands out, even slightly about her material. As an old girlfriend of mine once said, the longer it takes the RIAA to twig to the fact that being female doesn't mandate wanting to hear this formulaic ballad crap, the more business they are going to lose to independents who support bands like Opera IX. I think the fact that Mariah's last album disappeared without trace in spite of having millions of dollars spent on its promotion proves her right.

Mariah's story is also incredibly bland, to say the least. So her junkie mother gave her up when she was young. Oh boo hoo. It happens, and you're probably better off for it, get over it already. The previously-mentioned Jacksons could run rings around the likes of Mariah Carey for sob stories, and their reluctance to deal with the media at large is a telling thing. So in the end, we are simply left with another example of the mainstream trying to seem alternative, and failing.

I gave Glitter a one out of ten. I don't think I am being too harsh. I think it is so amazingly bad that it becomes comedic, at least on the first viewing. I suspect that repeated viewings will simply become boring.

So bad it's fabulous. This movie bombed big-time when it opened, I saw it in the theater with an audience of 5 other people and have watched it several times since. So much bad press at the time! There was a rumor that it was originally supposed to be set in the 80's, but that part was cut out, only the wacky costumes remained. That would explain the presence of Ann Magnusona as a press agent for the record company. Mariah is sincerely likable and sings beautifully. The same cannot be said for poor Padma Lakshima. Sort of an R&B version of "A Star Is Born", you will find yourself laughing in all the wrong places. Every cliché in the book and then some. There is a fashion photo shoot with silver body paint, and an evening dress that goes from stage to farm in one day. A classic rags to riches tale that seems to have been written by a teenager.

CC

"Glitter" might have been a camp classic if the story wasn't so dull and downbeat. It's yet another rewrite of "A Star Is Born", here turned into a vehicle for pop star Mariah Carey and apparently patterned after her own rise to the top (audiences weren't fooled, however, by the updated, late-night-movie clichés). Carey's funky/erotic music is driving (and her performance as blazing new talent Billie Frank is adequate), but the script for "Glitter" seems left over from the 1950s. Didn't the writers realize that times have changed and that Billie didn't have to be such a diva-doormat? Actresses of a lot higher caliber than Mariah Carey have fallen into this trap--they just don't want to see themselves on the screen acting bitchy and tough, so they end up playing the simp. "Glitter" features some rich cinematography (nice shots of the Big Apple), but it is too soft to make an impression--even as an unintended comedy. *1/2 from ****