TheLittleSongbird Seeing 'Glitter' with an open mind, despite its notoriously awful reputation, it is not quite as horrendous to be down there with the worst films of all time, but the problems 'Glitter' has are plentiful and are significant enough to consider it a very bad film still.The good news is that Mariah Carey does sound absolutely incredible, always have loved her voice with its beautiful tone, emotional connection and uniquely wide range. Also Terrence Howard is quite good and steals scenes.However, Carey's enviable skills as a singer does not translate in her skills as an actress, it was really strange that an artist with such a huge vocal range (five octaves!) is the complete antithesis in her very one-note and often expressionless acting here, which is devoid of any joy, surprise, sincerity or emotion. The ability to connect emotionally with her songs also doesn't translate in the acting, she looks stiff and bored throughout here.Unfortunately, the songs here do nothing for her vocal talents either. She sings them very well indeed, but there are far more memorable and emotionally powerful songs from her out there that also display her unique vocal gifts much more. They're not awful, just bland. The rest of the acting is also poor, with Max Beesley being equally lousy and not sounding sure what accent to pull off, while with the characters Carey's is shallow, one-dimensional and very difficult to relate to (which is a huge dividend considering the type of story it is) and the rest are annoying caricatures, a couple even irrelevant to the story.Even for a film set in the 80s, 'Glitter' does much less than glitter and looks firmly stuck in the 80s. It looks gaudy and too much of the camera work is too gimmicky and amateurish. The structurally wafer-thin script, with clumsy attempts at being hip, embarrassingly unfunny humour and "poignant" moments that come over as emotionally manipulative, sounds even older than that and like an awkwardly written soap-opera rejected at first draft (and should have stayed there).'Glitter' has very little story, it's very thin and aimless, and padded by the bland and uninspiredly choreographed songs shot like a series of out of date music videos and subplots that come out of nowhere and go very little further than that (i.e. the reappearance of the cat or the reunion with her mother). It starts tedious and loses even more drive as it plods on, and throughout like Carey's performance there's no joy, no emotion and no substance. The direction is decidedly inept.Overall, not that horrendous but it is no wonder that Carey herself regrets being involved in this. 2/10 Bethany Cox

vchimpanzee The start of the movie, mostly black and white with a minimum of color, could have been the start of an Oscar or Golden Globe contender. That's if the quality of the acting and writing had remained the same. The musical quality, on the other hand, never went down--except of course for the fact that the music early on was more sophisticated and much of what came later was mindless but fun dance pop. If you like the kind of music Mariah Carey is known for, "Glitter" delivers. Most of the time I would consider a lot of that music to be garbage. But Mariah is one of the few singers of her style I can stand to listen to, and given that this style of music would be dominant in this movie, I actually found myself enjoying it. All the musicians were talented--except, of course, Sylk--who was secretly replaced by the phenomenal Billie as lead singer and didn't seem to know it as her mike was turned down and Billie's was turned up.I didn't think this movie was so bad overall. Sure, it's depressing, but plenty of good movies are. This wasn't outstanding, but it appeared to be telling a good story. Most of the actors were doing a good job. Toward the end, though, I realized this movie wasn't going to finish what it started, because it was only supposed to run for two hours including commercials. So the finish seemed kind of abrupt, and shocking. Nevertheless, the ending turned out to be satisfying.Of course, everyone seemed to point to one weakness in this movie. Yes, it was obvious Mariah had little acting experience. But in some scenes, I felt she did just fine. In others, where she had no challenge, she seemed capable of only three facial expressions, and one in particular. Wow, if she had really been that happy, this would have been a fun movie. Mariah probably was enjoying herself. Billie, maybe. But with a little imagination, I could pretend that really was Billie and experience the movie as if she was real.It wasn't as bad as everyone seems to think.

evk311 great movie , i enjoyed it a lot. i was interested in the story how an artist becomes a superstar , and this movies shows it all . it is the perfect example as well , Mariah Carey and her life story. this is how it was in the days,and this movie shows it exactly how the life was in that time.it shows how the people were and how they lived. if the people or the artist seems fake in the movie , it probably has been done like that for a reason, people were fake in that time in that kind of club scene , and they actually still are. anybody that came up with a negative review here ,probably totally missed the point of this movie. it is not about how great the actors are and how great the cinematography is - actually at that point i thought that was great as well-but it is all about the story . it shows you where an unknown artist got recognized for talent and makes it up all the way to the top. very interesting to see , specially because we all know Mariah Carey. i understand people don't like her guts and quality , but let's be honest , she is an amazing artist like nobody else , she is famous and has millions of fans for a reason . she is beautiful and talented.this movie is not so much about Mariah herself , but more about the story in general of an artist who had the chance to climb up in the jungle that is called music business.if you are interested in such a story , than you will see a jewel of a movie here. but if you are more interested in Oscar winning material with amazing plot and special effects and amazing written stories , OK this is not the movie for you , and you probably will write a review this is the worst movie you ever saw, just like anybody else here. that is so unfair , glitter is a great movie for what it wants to show, very well done . and best of all : very realistic.i saw Oscar winning movies , and i thought they were complete boring . so it is all a matter of tasteglitter is a great movie in my opinion, i would recommend it to anyone because it shows the real life of how musicians live and their dreams to become recognized and how they reach the top with ups and downs.i think the movie was not accepted so well , because Mariah played herself , and people were expecting world wonders . but they got just plain reality to see . a true story. if somebody else would have played the main actress roll , it would have been maybe better for the movie . Mariah has such a strong personality , it overwhelms the whole picture, it was no problem for me . i was looking for the story anyway. but my point is , if another actress would have done this job , the movie could have been accepted much better and maybe get an Oscar. not that there is something wrong with Mariah as an actress, but the fact that she is playing actually herself might look a bit self crowning. maybe that is the reason why so much people disliked this movie . you are a great singer , and you play yourself in a movie to show how great you are. that was plus and plus and too much plus for yourself , and will end up in negative. if you are so cool and so great it just looks better if someone else will do that acting roll , instead of when you will do it yourself.that didn't matter for me , i loved the story . i will watch it again and enjoy sometime soon. if you love the 80s and the life around that time , this movie is a MUST SEE.

MartinHafer There is an American Football term called "Piling on". It's a penalty where the opposing team stops the runner and after the play is blown dead, opposing players keep jumping on the guy with ball--a definite no-no. Well, to me, this film conjures up this term, as when the film came out, reviewers seemed to come out of the woodwork to say how terrible the film was. In fact, they took great delight in talking about how bad the film was--shortly after release it was already legendary--perhaps made more so by Mariah Carey's nervous breakdown. Many speculated that this film led to this. Well, while I'd never say this is a good film, it certainly wasn't as bad as they said and it seemed that people were just piling on poor Mariah. Now I am NOT a fan of her music--up until this film, I barely ever heard any of it, but I felt bad for her because of all the hubbub.As I said, the film isn't good but it isn't terrible. The biggest problems were with the script--which was essentially A STAR IS BORN. The film had already been made too many times by the time Barbra Streisand did it a few decades ago--now, the story is so old and has been done so many times that it just seemed like a giant cliché. In many ways, also, Mariah's character seemed a bit like a battered woman and it felt frustrating that she kept holding on to a guy who was an obvious jerk--making her character seem a bit pathetic. Additionally, the film suffered, at least for me, with a severe case of "music video-itis". In other words, there were so many musical numbers, at times it seemed more like a bunch of music videos strung together with a bare plot--not a real film. Of course, there have been much worse examples of this type of film--such as Paul McCartney's GIVE MY REGARDS TO BROAD STREET--which had significantly less plot than GLITTER (yes, it is possible).But, on the positive side, Ms. Carey sure can sing and was absolutely beautiful--in fact, stunning. Also, her acting (which took a lot of abuse) wasn't that bad, either. In fact, had this film gone over a bit better, I could have seen her going on to other acting projects and improving her craft. Now, however, I don't think there's a chance in a billion! So, my overall verdict is that this is an okay film at best. However, it did not deserve all the attention the Razzies gave it--it's not really a movie that is enjoyably bad...just a bit dull and very predictable. However, if you adore her music, you could do a lot worse than see this film.Poor Mariah. After this film tanked, all she had was her immense fortune and jet-set life.