(Enlarge) Naturi Naughton connects with hip-hop rhythms in "Fame," the new musical movie now at area theaters. (Photo by Saeed Adyani)

The music-saturated melodrama "Fame" made a splash back in 1980. It inspired many talented teens to dream about attending a high school for the performing arts and then getting into showbiz. "Fame" also inspired similar movies in the ensuing decades, so young audiences are primed to step up to this high school musical's official remake.

Everybody remembers the original movie's title song, which has literally been given a hip-hop beat in the updated version. The narrative structure of the remake otherwise remains much the same as it tracks a small group of kids through their four years at New York's High School for the Performing Arts. Like the original, the remake is as slickly enjoyable as it is shallow.

There's no denying how inspirational it is to watch gifted students burst into song, burst into tears and, in some cases, burst into careers. All that energy is cinematically choreographed in scenes that really convey the excitement felt by students moving to the next stage in life. In short, any moviegoer with a pulse will have a good time.

However, the episodic story is constantly cutting back and forth between characters. Just when something is getting interesting either in a school rehearsal room or at home with often-clueless parents, the movie suddenly cuts to something else. You get to know a lot of students, teachers and parents in this movie, but not always as well as you would like to.

Although on-screen titles chronologically nudge us from freshman through senior year, there isn't a keen enough sense of how these students have matured during that period. Individual sequences are fluidly constructed, but the overall high school experience often feels choppy in the telling.

Such reservations about the storytelling may gnaw at you, but they aren't strong enough to make you want to drop out of this high school movie. There are so many hopes and dreams on energetic display that you can't help getting caught up in that adolescent environment.

Among the students we get to know, arguably the most emotionally resonant is Denise (Naturi Naughton). She is the proverbial good girl whose strict parents have sent her here to study classical piano. When several classmates introduce her to a hip-hop vibe, Denise breaks into a shy smile as she realizes that there's a whole new world out there. More specifically, she is prompted to realize that she has a great singing voice and may well have what it takes to make it as a professional pop singer.

Naughton's performance soars on both a dramatic and musical level. Give that girl a contract!

Complicating Denise's change in career plans is that her father responds to hip-hop as if it were the devil's music, and dad isn't likely to respond any more favorably to Denise's hip new boyfriend, a rambunctious acting student named Malik (Collins Pennie).

For that matter, Malik's mother isn't very happy about him pursuing his performing arts dreams. The movie does include at least one pungent example of a student's totally supportive working-class father.

Another student who makes an endearing impression is Neil (Paul Iacono), an aspiring filmmaker whose earnest effort to make a short film in the outside world leads to heartbreaking events that certainly provide him with a painful life lesson. Several other students also have memorable moments as aspiring singers, dancers and musicians.

Also making the most of their fragmentary scenes are Debbie Allen as the principal, and Charles S. Dutton, Kelsey Grammer, Megan Mulally and Bebe Neuwirth as teachers.

The four school years go by in a blur, but it's such a lively blur that you'll exit the theater with an extra bounce in your step. Old-school parents will appreciate that the movie does give screen time to classical music and Broadway tunes, while their kids will pick up on the hip-hop vibe running through most of the other scenes. As for the school bell that rings at the very beginning of the movie, well, we've all heard that sound before. Grade: B

"Fame" (PG) is now playing at area theaters.

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