REVIEW: A Little Story Hardly Gets in the Way of Burlesque's Big, Dumb Dazzle

The first hour or so of Burlesque is good enough to eat with a spoon. It's completely honest about its frothy, heavily sequined ambitions: Unlike Darren Aronofky's upcoming Black Swan, Burlesque carries its high-camp flag proudly, never for a minute pretending it's really a serious, dark psychological study. Antin -- who also wrote the script -- isn't looking for cred. All he wants is dazzle, and he presents one shiny bauble after another for our delectation: There's Cher, warbling through two knock-'em-dead musical numbers and looking like the kind of fantasy-queen painting you might find airbrushed on the side of a van; and Aguilera prancing and strutting in a series of outlandish wigs and costumes -- an ice-blond flappers' bob; a tutu made of strawberry-cream ostrich feathers -- whose cumulative sparkle is probably enough to keep the nation of Austria solvent for the next 10 years. (The first name that comes up in the movie's "Special Thanks" credits is "Swarovski.")

This is a parade I truly hate to rain on, even with little tinsel raindrops. The problem is that Antin tries to pack too much story into what is essentially a flimsy gilt go-go cage. There are lots of characters milling around here -- Alan Cumming as an eyeliner'ed em-cee; Peter Gallagher as Tess's broke, beleaguered ex; Stanley Tucci as Tess's right-hand guy, always there to fix a broken zipper or wipe away a mascara-blackened tear -- and not enough for any of them to do. The two guys who vie for Ali's affections -- rich bad boy Eric Dane and nice poor boy Cam Gigandet -- are interchangeable pieces of beefcake, though I've seen more personality on an actual side of beef. There's some mild catfighting and a few amusing little hissy-fits, but there's not enough at stake in this story to make any of them matter. For such a big, shiny piece of filmmaking, Burlesque is far too even-toned emotionally; there are no shrill highs or guttural lows.

There's also too much unfortunate, wobbly handheld camerawork (the DP is Bojan Bazelli, who does, to his credit, give the movie a nice, spangly glow), and the musical numbers have been sliced-and-diced too aggressively in the editing room. (Why is it so hard to just let us watch performers dance?)

But even if Burlesque isn't the sly masterpiece that Paul Verhoeven's Showgirls is, it's at least deeply in touch with its own falsies.

The musical numbers aren't what purists would call burlesque -- they're more antic than they are sultry. But it's still fun to watch Aguilera, decked out in a satin corset and sparkly heels, shake her little powder-puff tail through a number like "But I'm a Good Girl." She's a likable presence, and her suitably outsize turn reminds me why her duet with Mick Jagger -- performed in a pair of skyscraper black platform heels -- is pretty much the only thing I remember from Martin Scorsese's otherwise perfunctory Rolling Stones documentary Shine a Light. And as an actress, she knows just what to do with Antin's intentionally ring-a-ding dialogue. "You wrote that? It's really good!" she exclaims earnestly as her lover boy tootles a dumb little tune on his Casio.

But what about Cher? The Cher I love most dearly is the big-schnozz, snaggle-toothed one, circa "The Beat Goes On," though she has proved herself a marvelous actress -- in pictures like Silkwood, Mask and Moonstruck, to name just a few -- through her many transformations. And regardless, her speaking voice (not to mention the one she sings with) remains the same, unchanged and unfussed-over. It's the voice of a woman who always sounds as if she's just about to laugh, even if her heart is breaking. That's the kind of woman you want as the patron sinner-saint of a movie like Burlesque, a love letter written in rhinestones, feathers and glitter glue.

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