As Good As It Gets

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Apart from the fact that this movie looks slicker and more technically accomplished than the original 1980 "Fame" movie, this remake is inferior to the original in every way you can think of. Of all the problems in the movie, I think the worst is the fact that NONE of the characters - students or teachers - is fleshed out sufficiently. The movie crams in so many characters that it doesn't have time to follow any for a decent length. The lack of a human angle probably explains why the movie doesn't have any bite - I remember the original movie had more grit and drama. This even extends to the musical/dance numbers - the music is instantly forgettable and the dancing is at its best mediocre. What the movie ends up being is very boring, even if you choose to watch the theatrical cut over the extended cut. Stick with the original movie.

While the 1980 film was not a masterpiece, with an abrupt ending, some rambling dialogue and an imbalance of development of characters, it was entertaining with great songs, spirited choreography, good performances and a story with themes that were relevant then and also are now. The 2009 Fame can be seen as a make-over and sadly it is not a good one. Kelsey Grammar and Charles S. Dutton give decent performances, the singing is quite good and tuneful and better than the material deserves and the finale is fun, but that's pretty much it. The film feels too much like a High School Musical film or something lifted from the Disney channel, which means dull lighting, sets with a overly-studio-bound look and at times awkward editing that looks like a bad music promo. Much preferred the soft-grained, grittier look of the 1980 film. The songs are not very memorable and nowhere near the standard of those from the 1980 film, which had three truly great songs while this film had no good original one and felt like various music commercials/promos cobbled together. Someone to Watch Over Me and the pre-existing classical music are fine but this criticism is more aimed for the songs written for the film. The script is all fluff and no depth, all gloss and no heart and is very shallow and scattershot structurally. The plot was little more than a throw-away in a painfully predictable way and little effort is made to show the grit and the atmosphere of being at a performing arts school that the 1980 film did brilliantly. The pacing was odd because the film did often feel too short and rushed but at the same time because of the vapidity and the stale feel of it all it was dull as well. The characters are mismatched and the film doesn't give anywhere near enough time to develop them or allow us to root for them, they're just cookie-cutter cut-outs ranging from bland to irritating. In fact the personalities are so flat they border on inter-changeable and without any distinction, maybe if there weren't as many and that the film was longer and this problem would have been halfway solved. The choreography is sometimes spirited but often lacks heart and originality, like with that Hot Lunch Jam re-creation which fell completely flat. Apart from Grammar and Dutton, the acting doesn't cut it, Megan Mullally looked medicated, Bebe Neuwirth has done a lot of stuff I've liked but she's over-bearing here and the younger cast's inexperience comes through loud and clear. To conclude, a rather lame make-over unfortunately but not without its moments. 3/10 Bethany Cox

This remake was doomed from the start. The original film is iconic- even those who haven't seen the film know the theme tune. How can you compete with Irene Cara's original version? The r'n'b remix that this new film uses is terrible. But it's not just the title song that this remake has to compete with. The remake cannot free itself from the shadow of the original.Remaking Fame was not an entirely ridiculous idea. The original was thirty years ago and with the advent of Facebook, YouTube, and all those X-factor type shows, shortcutting your way to fame seems like a real possibility. And the cast actually look like they could be at high school, instead of the original cast that looked like they could have children who were at high school. There was a lot of potential for the director and writer to make a film that didn't try to compete with the original, but was an alternative that could be equally enjoyable.This film focuses more on dance and music than it does acting (perhaps because the actors can't really act). We get the same types of characters that we got for the original, however in the original these characters didn't come off as stereotypes. They were fleshed out and I was gripped by their problems, which were far darker than this film. As a viewer you actually wanted to make an effort to follow all these different characters in the original. However in this film the characters are so cardboard and the situations so clichéd that it's easy to forget who they are. It makes the lyric in the title song: "baby, remember my name", amusingly ironic. For the time that the characters are on screen, most of them are annoying. The naive/stupid 'plain' girl and her wet boy-band reject love interest are particular standouts in that department.As in the original, the film marks each year of the characters' time at the school, starting from auditions to graduation, however the time gaps seem to be massive. Random characters and relationships will just come out of nowhere, and so the characters never really progress. Instead it's like amnesia occurs at the end of each year.You can tell which of the songs are from the original film because the other ones are so bland. There is a nice version of Out Here on My Own, although it doesn't compare with Irene Cara's version either in the musical or dramatic sense. Cara's character (Coco) was the showoff star who was actually more vulnerable than she appeared to be. In the new version, she's a bit of a loner- the equivalent of Bruno in the original.But what about those who haven't seen the original? You'll probably be even more lost than the ones who've seen the original and know what to expect. Because the film is character-driven, the lack of interesting characters will make the film seem infinitely long. It attempts to be gritty by adding in a few swear words and 'serious' issues but this just makes it worse. If it was really cheesy at least it might have been entertaining.In short, this film has nothing to say about fame, current or otherwise.

This film is just awful. I didn't want to see it, but my mom did want to see it. I did like musicals, so I went. It was like "Rent" or "In the Heights", without lovable characters, a good plot, or necessary development. The only good feeling was an awkward Megan Mullaly singing. By the way, why is Megan Mullaly in this movie?! The same goes for Kesley Grammar. And Debbie Allen. Well, she was in the original movie, but she shouldn't be in this movie still. At only one point did I think. I was thinking of better times than this!!! Just take my word for it. If you read my reviews, I just praise everything. Well, not this time! Just an awful, terrible movie. The worst movie of 2009.