Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

Roxie The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Ismael Gonzalez I'm sorry to say that this was such a bad movie, or sequel, or remake, or adaptation, I don't know how to call it. This is not even the shadow of the original. The original movie has distinctive characteristics. This one has no hope, no emotion, no real talent and, on top of that, a bad story with an awful ending. The start up was promising, however, the story-line immediately fell short. The inclusion of Debbie Allen was a nice touch as a key character from the original movie. The non-inclusion of Irene Cara was a no-no. You cannot think of the song Fame without thinking of Irene Cara. I'm sure that Megan Mullally and Kelsey Grammar are not happy... at all.

CJBx7 My initial impression of the 2009 remake of "Fame" was favorable, having seen only the scene where the failed ballet dancer contemplated taking his life in a subway station. I was impressed by the directorial style, where everything around him faded into a distant noise as he became overwhelmed by his feelings of hopelessness and futility. This is, unfortunately, the most striking scene of the whole movie, and not really enough to justify sitting through it for a whole two hours (I saw the "Extended Dance Edition"). If the rest of the movie would have been made with the same care, it would have been much more resonant and enjoyable. Unfortunately it was not, and this is why I was so disappointed with it.Upon viewing the complete movie from the beginning, I was taken with director Kevin Tancharoen's use of the cinema verité style in order to give the movie more of a documentary feeling. Unfortunately, his attempts at realism were severely undermined by the flat, one- dimensional characters, clichéd situations, and (for me) underwhelming dance and musical production numbers. Add to this the fact that the rather sloppily written screenplay attempts to cover too much ground for the movie's running time, trying to focus on so many characters that I was not able to really connect in a substantial way with any of them. The movie ultimately has a rather sterile, detached feel to it, and I found it difficult to really care about the characters because they came across as stock types (the shy, naïve starlet who comes this close to be taken advantage of, the angry inner city black youth, the selfish dancer who only cares about stardom). The production numbers did not impress me either, although Naturi Naughton did display an impressive vocal range and stage presence. This is especially worrisome to me, as I watched the "Extended Dance Edition". None of the dance numbers really stayed with me...I've seen better on shows like "Britain's Got Talent".The more experienced actors (Kelsey Grammar, Bebe Neuwirth, Charles Dutton, Megan Mullaly, and Debbie Allen) had little to do except for portray the teachers, which also come off as your typical authoritative/mean/condescending/inspirational stock types. The younger actors are fine in their roles, although not outstandingly charismatic or memorable. I can't really complain about the acting, though, since the script is so poorly conceived the actors simply don't have much to work with. Not even Meryl Streep and Laurence Olivier could have saved this one.One thing I did notice was a direct rip-off of a scene from "Mr. Holland's Opus", which is, in my mind, a far superior film whose characters truly resonate with the audience - a student does a rendition of the old Gershwin standard "Someone to Watch Over Me," and is instructed by the teacher that she needs to have a better grasp of what the words mean. The scene is slightly different here, but couldn't they have at least have chosen a different song? This, to me, is symbolic of what is wrong with this movie - lazy, formulaic plotting, stock characterizations, and a poorly conceived script. There are so many characters on display that at the end of the movie, I didn't know what happened to all of them. What happened to the aspiring director at the end? Or the dancer's best friend (and it was news to me that they were friends until the end of the movie?) The filmmakers didn't even so much as put an epilogue on the end that you could read in order to figure out what became of the characters. Overall, I felt like the movie was a waste of my time. Disappointing.

twilliams76 Wretched. Horrible. Awful. Pathetic and sad. When the lights burnt out of the title before the movie even began, I foresaw bad things for this movie. It is so full of cliché and stereotypes.This is one of the most poorly made (this is my biggest complaint) films I have seen in recent years -- nothing seemed to really matter to anybody involved. Bad script, horrible acting (Kay Panabaker may be the MOST annoying actress I have ever run across), implausible situations ... ugh. Stupid and trite. Fake emotions and tears. I actually felt awful when I wanted a kid to go ahead and kill himself because he was wearing horrible pants. I didn't care for a single soul in this film because NONE of it felt real(istic).I can watch So You Think You Can Dance or Glee or American Idol on television and care more for any of those people I see on screen than I did here. Fame is all truly tragic ... and not in a good King Lear-tragic kind of way. There seems to be no real heart or emotion in this thing -- perhaps it is adequately named since fame is what so many people seem to care about anymore ... it doesn't matter what one does to "earn" it.Famehorrors! (this could've been spelled another way but I think it would have been rejected -- although BOTH words fit) -- and this dud of a film was full of them since not one of them seemed to genuinely care that the movie was terrible.The original television show deserved better!

smcgann14 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.