Spice World

Starring: Melanie Brown, Emma Bunton, Melanie C, Geri Horner, Victoria Beckham, Kevin Allen, Alan Cumming, Jason Flemyng, Stephen Fry, Richard E. Grant, Bob Hoskins, Elton John, Hugh Laurie, Meat Loaf, Kevin McNally, Roger Moore, Jennifer Saunders, Dominic West
Directed by: Bob Spiers
Rating: PG
Genre: Comedy, Musical
1998

Times Seen:
Tim: 2

Summary: The Spice Girls have adventures around London while there are those who scheme towards their demise.

Review:

Tim: Watching Spice World twenty years after its release (I saw the movie for the first time shortly after its release on DVD. Or was it video cassette?), it feels a little surprising that this movie ever got made. The Spice Girls feel old and the years since they really mattered are many. It's somewhat fascinating to watch a film made when they were on top of the world. And it's interesting to see what an utter disaster this movie is. I rated it low, but probably higher than it deserved because it felt harmlessly awful to me. Almost like there was no ill intent, it was just a film that should never have been made. It ambles along with a smile and shouts of "Girl Power!" and it takes a little while for you to realize that you're watching a terrible movie.

I suppose I'm not completely opposed to a movie being made about the Spice Girls. Just not this movie. It's a total mess. A lot of the film is just the Spice Girls being the Spice Girls. You can almost see an executive saying, "Just give the people what they want!" That is pretty boring, but not quite awful. Then you start adding all these ridiculous asides. There's a subplot about a staffer being overworked, fighting among the Spice Girls leading up to the biggest concert of their career, a member of the media determined to highlight the dark side of the Spice Girls through leaking controversial information, a bomb subplot and a really stupid scene with an alien. None of it makes any sense and it feels like no one was trying very hard. Just throw a bunch of utter crap up on the screen, let the Spice Girls be the Spice Girls, and people will flock to theaters! The sad thing is that from a box office perspective, it worked. This movie did well. It was celebrated last year with a re-release on its 20th anniversary. I can only shake my head at people celebrating an anniversary for such a pathetically bad movie.

What bothers me is that this movie succeeding financially by taking the approach that Spice Girls fans are stupid and will show up to see a movie about them, no matter how terrible. You can't watch this film and truly believe anyone was interested in making something special. Maybe the Spice Girls themselves, out of sheer naivety. No one else could have been mistaken about what a bomb they were producing.

Now, I can't say I'm that upset at the Spice Girls. They showed up, acted like themselves (any time they didn't, you were immediately aware none of them had any acting talent) and genuinely seemed to have fun together on screen. I'm looking for pluses here. That part of the movie was decent- seeing them interact together. Alan Cumming should never have been in this film, but I admit he tries. He put effort into his performance, it just doesn't get him anywhere. It was hard to see acting talents like Bob Hoskins and Roger Moore here. They deserved better than this.

I suppose I don't need to continue to beat a dead horse. Spice World is a pretty awful movie. It's not entertaining and its short 1 hour, 33 minute run time feels at least 18 hours longer than it actually is. I give the movie some credit for its energy and appealing to its primary demographic, but there's almost nothing positive to take away from this film. It's truly one of the worst.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 3.5



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