BURLESQUE * * *
Cert 12A, 118mins
It’s a familiar story, one that’s been well-trodden in films like Coyote Ugly and Showgirls. A young girl with ambitions to perform arrives in the big city and ends up dancing and singing while standing on a bar, or stripping in Vegas.

Orphan Ali (Christina Aguilera) moves from Iowa to LA to become a singer and finds herself dazzled by the bright lights and glamorous costumes of the girls in the Burlesque Lounge on Sunset Strip, a club run by Tess (Cher).

No wonder she wants to work here – it must be the only burlesque show where no-one ends up naked. It is only a 12A certificate, after all. They may be wearing scanty underwear, but there’s not much sizzling sexiness going on.

Working her way up from waitress to chorus girl, she inevitably gets the chance to show off her singing talent and become the star of the show, though she does have to contend with rival Nikki (Kristen Bell, being refreshingly nasty for a change).

The love intrigue (which isn’t the slightest bit intriguing, just entirely predictable) has Ali having to choose between struggling barman songwriter Cam Gigandet, who has a fiancée, and rich, charming businessman Eric Dane, who buys her fabulous Louis Vuitton shoes.

Aguilera certainly has a good pair of lungs on her and is mesmerising on stage in the well-produced musical numbers.

She’s not quite so hot off it, just about pulling off her leading role debut but hardly troubling any awards judges.

We know Cher can act, but she somehow forgets how to here. And looks rather too much like a drag artist while performing.

Thank goodness for Stanley Tucci as her right hand man Sean. Alan Cumming, meanwhile, is completely wasted in the role of a doorman who’s allowed on stage for all of a minute, and if you blink you might well miss Glee star Dianna Agron.

The dialogue is mostly clichéd, though occasionally amusing.

Expect sequins, sparkle and camp fun, just don’t go looking for sensual thrills.  RL

TRON: LEGACY * * * *
Cert PG, 125mins
It has been a very good year for Jeff Bridges – and things could soon be even better for the veteran star.

Fresh from winning the best actor Oscar this spring for Crazy Heart, we’ll see him in the Coen Brothers’ remake of John Wayne’s True Grit in mid-Februrary.

In the meantime, we now get two Jeffs for the price of one in Disney’s latest family blockbuster – a “stand-alone follow-up” to the studio’s original Tron.

A US release in July 1982 just days after Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, this was such an incredibly-groundbreaking film in its day that it predated the internet by 20 years.

By mixing computer graphics, virtual sets, backlit effects and hand-drawn animation, Tron signalled a new approach to special effects (though its only Oscar nods were for costume and sound).

At its heart, Bridges played a hacker called Kevin Flynn who was sucked into an unfamiliar computer world.

Flynn wanted the best of both the real and digital worlds, but now he hasn’t been seen for 20 years after disappearing in 1989.

Born in 1983, his only son Sam is a biker with no interest in becoming a suit at the still successful Encom company.

Indeed, just when the business is about to launch on the Japanese stockmarket thanks to a featureless new version of its coveted operating system, 27-year-old Sam effectively thinks like internet founder Tim Berners-Lee – that software should be about opening up the system for universal benefit ahead of profits.

Cue an act of corporate sabotage with the help of a dog.

Receiving a signal from old Flynn’s Arcade which could only have come from his father, Sam finds himself transported into a place that is entirely new to him.

He’s a bit like Marty McFly in Back to the Future (1985), only his next world was actually invented by his dad.

Grid is also home to a younger version of Kevin.

CLU, as he is crudely called, has seized control of the site and its inhabitants, so you could argue that this film is a warning of the ethicacy of cloning in all of its forms, human and farming.

This particular clone might be cinema’s latest one-dimensional evil nemesis.

But since he has a believably much younger face than the older Kevin (also played by Bridges), such film technology could open up a whole new vanitiverse for actors who don’t want to end up looking like Cher in Burlesque.

Director Joseph Kosinksi offers little humour, tension, emotion or editorial control in his film which would have been much better if it had just run for 90 minutes.

It’s a mystery why it tries to match the bloated running time of the Wachowski Bros’ post Matrix-trilogy effort, Speed Racer (2008).

But the considerable upside – worth an extra star alone – is that fact this is also one of the most beautiful movies I’ve ever seen and one of the best yet in terms of making the most of Millennium Point’s amazing IMAX screen and accompanying sound system.

As a trained architect, Koskinski gives the film a stunning sense of perspective, a pretty useful talent when you are also trying to make a state-of-the-art 3D movie with a design flair which matches Apple’s latest aluminium gadgets.

Disney reckon this film uses even more advanced gear than Avatar and you’d be hard pressed to argue with that when you see some of the results on screen.

While too much of Tron: Legacy languishes in a plotless world of confusion and electronic Frisbee throwing which left me cold, there are unexpected bonuses.

Helping to save the day is Michael Sheen as club boss Castor, a bizarre, almost albino cross between Ziggy Stardust and Marc Almond.

Newcomer Garrett Hedlund offers shades of David Beckham in the looks department as son Sam.

And the electronic score by French techno-popsters Daft Punk is simply awesome at IMAX.    GY

FRED: THE MOVIE *
Cert 12A, 85mins
With a voice that grates throughout like nails scratching a blackboard, Fred Figglehorn (Lucas Cruikshank) is an almost unwatchable, hyperactive character – and the exact opposite in every sense of Emma Stone’s brilliant performance in the October film that got away, Easy A.

Credit to Cruikshank for doubling up as the considerably more laidback Derf, but if there’s a more irritating film this year I’d hate to see it so close to this Nickelodeon TV movie.

Despite his dad being played by muscleman wrestler John Cena, Fred is bullied by another kid from across the street.

But he still hopes to make himself known to girl next door Judy, played by British pop sensation Pixie Lott who could be a very big star indeed if her platinum hair doesn’t break away from its dark roots.

She might have moved by the time he’s plucked up the courage, but at least he’s now got his tail up to go after her...

Thanks to a series of vomit gags and Jackass / Home Alone-style smash-ups, this journey to hell has been rated a 12A for ‘behaviour that would be dangerous if copied’.

It’s the biggest favour the BBFC has done families this century, so use it as a good excuse to keep your own children away.

GY