Burlesque **** (2010, Cher, Christina Aguilera, Stanley Tucci, Kristen Bell, Eric Dane, Cam Gigandet, Peter Gallagher, Alan Cumming) – Classic Movie Review 6097

Writer-director  Steven Antin’s 2010 musical drama movie won the 2011 Golden Globe for Best Original Song for Diane Warren’s ‘You Haven’t Seen The Last of Me’ and another tune, ‘Bound to You’, was nominated. The Gay and Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association voted it Campy Film of the Year.

Although top-billed, Cher finds herself out-diva-ed, guest-starring in The Christina Aguilera Show. Staking her place as the ultimate pop diva, Christina sweeps all before here as Ali, a small-town girl who hoves up in LA and talks her way onto stage at a burlesque club run by Cher’s ex-dancer and her gay pal Sean (Stanley Tucci, reprising his The Devil Wears Prada turn).

Along the way, Christina locks horns with the show’s temperamental star Nikki (Kristen Bell), is courted by rich entrepreneur Marcus (Eric Dane) and shares more than a flat with lovely young bar boy Jack (Cam Gigandet) – a man who wears so much mascara that Christina thinks he is gay too. (That’s right, all gay men wear mascara or pick out the right frocks for dancers.)

Meanwhile, Cher has got her share of plot action. Her club is in financial trouble and her ex (Peter Gallagher) wants her to sell it off – but mamma ain’t sellin’!

Kitsch, camp, gossipy and showbizzy to the point of infinity, this musical is a hoot, with some pricelessly daft dialogue, all played like it’s Shakespeare. Not a single cliché is left unmined – deliberately – and this proves there’s still gold in them thar hills!

Christina’s knockout numbers sizzle with electricity and sexual frisson, while Cher gets two songs only, both of them showstoppers, one the title number ‘Welcome to Burlesque’ and the other ‘You Haven’t Seen The Last of Me’, neither of them (disappointingly) duetting with Christina.

Treated like a toy boy, Gigandet adds male sex appeal and keeps his dignity, though not always his clothes, and Tucci is very funny indeed. Alan Cumming plays Alexis, Julianne Hough plays Georgia, Dianna Agron plays Natalie, and Glynn Turman plays Harold Saint.

It is loads of fun: if you loved Showgirls, Gypsy and Mamma Mia!, you’ll be saying many thanks for a supercalifragilistic evening. Guilty pleasure or not, I loved it!

Cher waited till 2017 for her next film, the Mamma Mia! sequel, Here We Go Again.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 6097

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