entertainment

‘Spice World’ brainless and threadbare

By Gordon Flurkey ⋅ March 11, 1998 ⋅  Email this article ⋅  Print this article ⋅ Post a comment

It wasn’t enough that they had deceived millions of people into buying their albums. The Spice Girls want more money — and what better, faster and cheaper way than to have someone take a handicam and point it at them as they wobble around in their hideous pumps and inch-thick make-up, and call it Spice World: The Movie.

In this brainless piece of crap the Girls (Geri “Sexy Spice,” Emma “Baby Spice,” Victoria “Posh Spice,” Mel C. “Sporty Spice,” and Mel B. “Scary Spice”) portray themselves (what else can they do?). The plot has something to do with getting the group and its oversized, overpainted bus to the Royal Albert Hall in time for an apparently monumental, history-making live gig. But — Gasp! — Posh can’t figure out what to wear.

Meanwhile, a geeky music documentarian fitfully tries to capture the band’s essence on video. Posh still can’t figure out what to wear.
A yakkity yak producer wants to turn the girls into movie stars. Posh still can’t figure out what to wear. A sleazy tabloid wants to
destroy the Spice Girls to help sell more papers. Now none of them can figure out what to wear — so they change clothes, shoes,
hairstyles, and accessories 50,798 times in an hour and a half, all the while lipsynching songs from their two albums and plastering
their faces into the camera.

The entire movie is a vulgar attempt to imitate the Beatles in their historic 60’s movie A Hard Day’s Night. Idiocy and sheer cluelessness abound in every scene, the dialogue is ridiculous, and the plot threadbare. This film is completely devoid of artistic merit.

Opting for an easy laugh, the Girls spend most of their time making jokes at their own expense — poking fun at their fame, their
excesses, their foibles, and their overexposure, as well as the dreaded “Spice Girls Backlash.” But even when they’re self-deprecating the Spice Girls still stink.

Then of course there’s the “Girl Power” sloganeering thing, which a lot of people (mostly gullible prepubescent little girls) are really buying into. Oh yes, nothing is more empowering than dressing up like a transvestite and call yourself a “Girl.”

To recapitulate: Spiceworld is a waste of time and money so don’t go see it. Go see The Postman instead. At least they spent some money on that one to make it sensible and intelligible.

Grade: F