Burlesque: Approach With Caution, Glitter

This still is more exciting than 99.999999% of the movie.

I love Cher. I would follow that crazy dancing, singing, walking, talking Real Doll to the ends of the Earth and beyond. She's half-Armenian, half-Sleestak and all love.

And I'm opening on this note of Cherophilia because I feel the need to justify my purchase of tickets - at full price (10$) to Burlesque (a film worth 0.01$, if anything.)

It seemed like a good idea at the time. Singing, dancing, costumes, Alan Cumming, Cher, Cher, Cher - but I was cruelly mistaken. I forgot to reckon on the presence of Christina Aguilera, Aguilera, Aguilera.

There's no denying the girl can sing, except that like Celine Dion, she uses her great power for great evil. Aguilera seems to have never met a note she wouldn't turn into an octave, complete with growling "uh-hrrrrrrrrr" intro. The only raft in the ocean of terrifying yell-singing was a Cher ballad. Seriously, Cher isn't the most dramatic thing on screen. The Pro Tooled notes soothed my frayed nerves for a few minutes, but then it was time for Aguilera to slather on the melisma again. And for me to slouch further down in my seat.

Have you ever seen Coyote Ugly? Well, make the acting even worse and you'll have this movie. Listen to Aguilera speak the line "I'm only taking what's owed me, not a penny more" and hear someone who might have learned her lines phonetically. However, even the real actors don't get much in the way of assistance from the script. Poor, pretty, perpetually shirtless Cam Gigandet gets the worst of it. In a wedding scene, he gets in a phone argument with his fiancée and has to say "Yeah, we should talk about our future. In fact, I think I'm looking at my future right now."

Now, by rights, he should have been staring meaningfully at the buffet table while saying this. Instead, of course, he's got to gaze longingly at Christina Aguilera. I don't want to slut shame anyone, but I remember her "Dirrty/Xtina" period. That's a future full of new and exciting STI's Gigandet is staring down, my friends.

Any movie reflections should end with at least one positive comment, and here's one for Burlesque: It kept the sequin stitchers of America employed during this trying economic downturn.

Don't see it, no matter how much you've had to drink.