Golden girl lacks lustre

ALL that glitters definitely isn’t gold. In this case, it’s more like soot - painfully written, horribly acted, and awkwardly directed.

Sometimes when a film misfires, it’s difficult to figure out who was responsible. On this occasion, it’s easy - everyone whose name appears in the credits. For a tearjerker with modest ambitions, Glitter is excruciatingly inept.

Glitter (Drama, PG. Rating: *) is obviously a star vehicle for Mariah Carey, and it should force Hollywood executives to re-consider the flawed concept that the success of a performer in one arena of pop culture will automatically translate to another.

The list of non-rap singers who have forged effective acting careers is relatively short. Most of these wannabe-thespian divas turn out to be like Madonna and Whitney Houston,giving performances that seem de-signed exclusively to torture audiences.

Carey falls into that camp. She may have a 1000-watt smile, but she cannot act. Glitter, inexplicably set during the 1980s, is the rags-to-riches story of a young woman who, through lots of hard work and a little luck, hits the big time. Glitter realises that it won’t attract any audience without plenty of

songs.

Unfortunately, everything sung by Carey sounds uninspired and generic, and the lip-synching is awful.

Carey plays Billie Franklin, an orphan who grows up to be a backup singer to a rising pop star.

Dice (Max Beesley), a popular New York club DJ, discovers Billie’s secret - not only does she do backup for the star, she ghost sings for her as well. So Dice buys Billie’s contract for $100,000 and, together, they launch her career.

Eventually, he gets jealous of her success, and they break up. There’s also a lame subplot about her at-tempting to find her mother, whom she hasn’t seen in more than 10 years.

One curious thing about this film is the lack of a big name actor to balance out Carey’s inexperience.

Carey’s co-star is Max Beesley, who is bad enough not to completely embarrass Carey by comparison.

There are enough howlingly bad lines of dialogue in Glitter to provide occasional breaks of unintentional laughter, but, even with those interruptions, this film is agonising to sit through.

Glitter lacks anything resembling a sparkle, and, as a film star, Carey is the equivalent of a black hole.