As a musical, pure and simple, 'Mamma Mia' has the briefest and silliest of stories, backed up by a large selection of Abba songs (Super Trouper, SOS, Voulez Vous, Gimme Gimme Gimme, Money Money Money, Dancing Queen, The Winner Takes It All, Lay All Your Love On Me, Our Last Summer, Mamma Mia, etc.).

Meryl Streep has a daughter about to marry, and a cloudy past which has left three possible dads - Sam (Pierce Brosnan),Harry (Colin Firth),and Bill (Stellan Skarsgard). Now you can imagine that when Brosnan was James Bond he never thought he'd be cavorting along to Swedish pop on the big screen - but despite his weak voice, he does OK - the same can be said for Firth, who seems to choose roles with such little discrimination it is no longer a surprise to see him in anything.

Donna (Streep) also has two friends to support her - Julie Walters and Christine Baranski. Walters is as fun as ever, cavorting in her headscarf and singing appallingly; while Baranski is another Samantha from Sex and the City - chasing young barmen and struggling in her high heeled boots. Their scenes together and apart are hilarious - and Streep's singing cannot be faulted.

Is the film any good? It is hard to tell. It is certainly fun, and funny. The direction isn't particularly inspired, nor is the screenplay clever or profound - but then, neither is the music of Abba. Taken purely as bubblegum, feel-good cinema, it does OK, and isn't as bad as you might have expected.

Armed with irresistible hooks, soaring melodies and near-celestial vocal stylings, the Swedish pop group ABBA churned out a body of insanely catchy and superbly crafted tunes - "Waterloo," "SOS," "Fernando," "Dancing Queen," "The Winner Takes it All," etc. - that made it the world's top-selling musical act of the 1970's and early 1980's. Several decades later, ABBA's music became the basis for a hit stage musical entitled "Mamma Mia!" in which a simple narrative was deftly woven around many of the quartet's songs. Now, the much-ballyhooed movie version of "Mamma Mia!," written by Catherine Johnson and directed by Phyllida Lloyd, has arrived on the scene.

The story takes place on a beautiful Greek island where the never-married Donna (Meryl Streep) single-handedly runs a modest hotel for an ever-thinning crowd of tourists. Her daughter, Sophie (the charming Amanda Seyfried),has never known who her real father is, mainly because Donna herself doesn't even know. With the help of her mother's diary from twenty years ago, Sophie narrows the candidates down to three (Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth and Stellan Skarsgard),then secretly invites them to her wedding in the hope that she will be able to figure out which of them is her real father in time to have him accompany her down the aisle.

On stage, "Mamma Mia!" succeeded primarily because it was able to keep its wafer-thin storyline modest in scale and life-sized in scope. But blown up to the magnified proportions of the big screen, the material becomes a compendium of overacting (Julie Walters being the most egregious culprit in that regard),ham-handed literalization, forced spontaneity, and production values that look both gaudy and chintzy at one and the same time. Moreover, the direction is clunky, the choreography abysmal (especially compared to what we were treated to in "Hairspray" just a year ago),the photography either over or underexposed (depending on whether the scene is set at night or during the day),and the singing not unlike what one might hear emanating from the local pub on an average karaoke-night.

In fact, there has always been an inherent problem built into "Mamma Mia!," which is that much of ABBA's charm derives from the crystalline voices of its lead singers, Anni-Frid Lyngstad and Agnetha Faltskog. Take away those harmonies and at least a certain percentage of that charm is lost. Now the movie version of "Mamma Mia!" comes along and simply compounds the problem by hiring big-name actors rather than trained singers to somehow interpret the pieces for us. Indeed, this must be the only musical in movie history made up almost entirely of people who can't sing (at least in the old days they used to dub the voices in if they had to). One has to give Streep brownie points for at least trying to belt out the tunes, but her rendition of "The Winner Takes it All," which was the rafter-rattling showstopper in the stage version, falls flat due not only to her own inadequacies as a vocalist but to the awkward staging and foolish hand gestures she uses to accompany her singing (almost as if she were trying to act out the lyrics as she's singing them). Actually, I've never understood why anyone would buy either the original cast recording or the soundtrack to "Mamma Mia!" anyway when the real thing is readily available and clearly far superior to any imitation.

All that being said, I am still inclined to at least half-heartedly recommend that people go to see this movie for a number of reasons. First, because the music itself (written by Benny Anderson and Bjorn Ulvaeus) is fun, infectious and finally irresistible, no matter how much the singers may be unintentionally stomping all over it; second, because even though their singing leaves much to be desired, Streep, Bosnan and Seyfried somehow make us care about the characters and the silly little predicament they're caught up in; and third, because there are a number of scenes that actually work quite nicely, the best being when Donna sings the sweet mother's lament "Slipping Through My Fingers" (a song clearly within Streep's limited vocal range) to her soon-to-be-wed daughter. Streep and Seyfried are both very moving and poignant not only in that particular scene but in all of the scenes in which they appear together.

For the half dozen or so audience members who aren't already familiar with the ABBA oeuvre, one can only hope that they will use "Mamma Mia!" as a springboard to sampling the real deal.

My daughter is right...it's probably better to just pop in an ABBA album than watch this film. However, despite cringing at a few of the songs (one of Pierce Brosnan's solos made my ears bleed and Julie Walter's "Take a Chance" made me attempt suicide--twice) and blanching at the dopey plot, I couldn't help but still enjoy the film on a totally brainless level because no matter who sings the songs (even Pierce),you can't help but tap your feet and enjoy the songs of ABBA...even if it's being sung by boobs. Like most people who saw this film, it brought me back to my younger days when the group was still around...however, my love for ABBA does NOT mean that I am so blinded as to ignore the many dumb moments in this film.

Here are the dumb points to this film:

1. The film is basically BUONA SERA MRS. CAMPBELL set to ABBA music. Come on, folks--try something new.

2.Clichés, clichés, clichés!!! Some of the worst and most amateur writing and dialog I've heard in years.

3. You make a musical and you choose people who can either sing adequately (Streep) or barely at all. Brosnan actually wasn't always horrible in the film (his third solo song was nice) but when he was bad, he was bad....really bad. Worse than Satan bad!

4. It's a great message for the kids here--a heart-warming family film about a single mom who turns out to be a super-slut. And, despite risking STDs and having a kid to raise all alone, everything works out perfectly in the end (14 year-olds take note).

5. Garish production numbers and a case of too much, too often when it comes to the songs. It often took the place of plot and made the film look, at times, like a giant music video. A musical is not the same as a two hour long music video.

So, while it's obvious that I didn't like the movie technically (uggh),it STILL is worth seeing just because ABBA is just amazing. Instead, however, I'd have just preferred they kidnapped Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Frida and made them perform once last time on film--now THAT would have been worth seeing!

Oh, and while I am thinking of it, all you oldsters out there (like me),you might want to think twice about seeing this film around your kids unless they already love ABBA---otherwise you'll never get them to like or listen to ABBA again after hearing their songs sung so poorly.

By the way, read over Leandro Dubost's review for a laugh. I really enjoyed the Hitler comment--not at all politically correct, but it made me laugh