Hollywood loves a good biographical drama, and the more comfortable it gets with telling these stories, the more inevitable it will be that any entertainer with even the vaguest level of fame will ultimately be subjected to some form of life story being told on film – some of them are better than others, but they are most are bland efforts, deeply mediocre works that attempt to capitalize on an individual’s popularity by exploring their rise to fame and, if it applies, their eventual decline. They all follow a familiar formula, and it’s hardly surprising that the person behind many of them is Anthony McCarten, who has made an entire career from writing run-of-the-mill biographical films about some of the most notable individuals in world history. His most recent effort covers the tragic life of Whitney Houston, whose personal life was mired with controversies and addictions that often distracted from her immense talents, which were lost far too soon – or rather, this is how he approaches I Wanna Dance with Somebody, his deeply mediocre examination of the life of Houston, from her days as a milquetoast choir girl and backup singer for her mother, to a global phenomenon that is still widely considered the greatest singer to ever live, carrying with her the nickname “The Voice”, which is certainly appropriate considering her vocal talents. The only surprising aspect of this film is that it took so long to be made – it has been a decade since Houston’s untimely passing, and considering how shameless the industry can be, it is odd that it took them this long to crank out a cradle-to-grave account of her rise and fall, especially since she was unfortunately a very easy target for the kind of lacklustre, sensationalistic dramas that we have seen spring up almost overnight in recent years, becoming more prominent than ever, a trend that is only made more disturbing by the fact that it seems to not be showing signs of abating any time soon, meaning that we are likely going to receive countless other bland biographical dramas before someone finally starts to question not only their artistic integrity, but their ethics as a whole.

The main issue with I Wanna Dance with Somebody is not that it is a bad film (if anything, it is the definition of serviceable), it is that it is far too conventional to ever be even vaguely interesting. The film avoids every risk imaginable, and whether this is to appease Houston’s estate, who would be actively involved in the film’s production and thus had the final word on what could be shown on screen, or because audiences tend to prefer these by-the-numbers biographical dramas that refuse to do anything all that interesting, its clear that this is not the film that Houston deserved. Kasi Lemmons started her career making fascinating arthouse films like Eve’s Bayou and The Caveman’s Valentine, but has sadly seemed to have taken on directing the most conventional, run-of-the-mill biographical dramas that follow every rule in the book to the very end, and do very little in terms of experimenting or finding new ways to tell a story. As harsh as it is to say, I Wanna Dance with Somebody represents a new low for a director who was previously celebrated for her unique voice and ability to draw out so much meaning from even the most paltry of material – and unlike Harriet (where she at least still retained some sense of an authorial vision), this film drowns out her voice as a black female director to emphasize that of McCarten, whose supposed aptitude at writing these biographical accounts of famous individuals has somehow become an indication of quality, when in reality he has just mastered the art of choosing three dozen of the most famous moments in an individual’s life and stringing them together to give off the illusion that he is constructing an insightful and meaningful analysis of their lives, when in reality he is not doing anything we haven’t seen before, outside of slightly tarnishing the legacy of his subject, who deserved far better than his heavy-handed writing, which is so pedestrian, even the most inexperienced viewer will likely be able to think of ways of restructuring this bland and lifeless script that serves as nothing more than a whistle-stop tour of Houston’s life, trying to compress as much of her existence into 150 minutes as possible.

The one person who we simply cannot blame for the dismal result that is I Wanna Dance with Somebody is Naomi Ackie, who likely saw playing Whitney Houston as the opportunity of a lifetime. Despite her lack of resemblance to the famed singer (which isn’t as massive a problem as some make it out to be – as long as the performance is good, we can overlook appearance, as long as it is in the general wheelhouse of the character they are playing), Ackie commits fully to the role – her performance is the kind that you wish was in a different film, because it is far too good for what we received, every choice made being almost counterintuitive to her sensibilities. You can see her struggling to humanize Houston, since the film is constantly pushing against any kind of development, since it simply doesn’t offer what was required, and as a result her performance suffers. Ackie is an absolutely brilliant performer, and she does her best to embody Houston without feeling like a caricature – somewhere deep in this film is an incredible performance, and she certainly had the potential to elevate it to a place where it wasn’t just exploitative. In fact, every performance in I Wanna Dance with Somebody is quite good – Tamara Tunie is magnificent as Cissy Houston, the legendary matriarch of this family who presides over her daughter’s affairs with a blend of motherly wisdom and iron-fisted austerity, allowing us some insights into the mind of a mother seeing her child live out her dreams of fame, and actively being proud of witnessing her daughter achieve everything she imagined. Clarke Peters and Stanley Tucci are two acting veterans who add gravitas to the film, playing Houston’s father and the legendary record executive Clive Davis respectively, the latter taking on a role as both a manager and confidante to the impressionable young singer, who he single-handedly helped fashion into a worldwide icon. It’s peculiar that I Wanna Dance with Somebody contains some genuinely great performances, but ultimately doesn’t do well as a film – this is essentially the result of taking a promising story and a good set of characters and not paying enough attention, instead choosing a hackneyed, unconvincing approach that simply doesn’t work in the film’s favour in any way.

More than anything else, I Wanna Dance with Somebody feels like it teeters on being mean-spirited, which is entirely unintentional. It doesn’t seem like anyone involved in the actual creation of the film had much reverence for Houston in the way that someone in charge with committing an artist’s life to the screen should – instead, its a series of scenes in which major moments of her life are recreated, aligned with notes by both the studio (who were invested in having a film that met all the criteria of the genre), and the estate, who would certainly not allow the film to tackle anything that would show Houston in a negative light – even her well-documented addiction is relegated to a few brief scenes, which may have ultimately been the right choice, since McCarten has never had an issue exploiting emotions to get a story told. It often feels like it cheapens Houston’s legacy, refusing to look at her as anything other than a public figure, someone to look at with a mix of sympathy and pity, rather than a three-dimensional, meaningful individual with a life that extended far beyond what the tabloids represented. Any film that seems to have been written by someone who had the artist’s internet biography open, using it as the primary guide to how to divide their life into chapters, is ultimately not worth watching, and I Wanna Dance with Somebody is one of the most blatant culprits in this new trend of churning out conventional biographical dramas that are almost anonymous in their directorial vision, and instead are sold solely on the name of the person being portrayed, meaning that good performances, strong writing or compassionate direction become optional, since there’s an expectation that, regardless of quality, audiences will always be attracted to these films based on the subject matter.

It is certainly understandable why someone would decide to make a film about Houston’s life, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they should have done so, especially not in a way that is about as conventional and unconvincing as possible. McCarten was the wrong writer to bring this story to life, and not even a genuinely gifted director like Lemmons could do anything with the material to make it even vaguely convincing. She’s not complicit in the failure of the film (since this is clearly cobbled from the directions of studio executives working under the guidance of the estate – it is a money-making endeavour more than it is an artistic examination of one of the greatest entertainers of her generation), but she also doesn’t do nearly enough to insert her own creative voice into the film, meaning that this is almost anonymous in its direction, since any creative flourishes are entirely absent. It’s bewildering to imagine the reasons behind making I Wanna Dance with Somebody outside of delivering a conventional biographical film that will appeal to viewers who either adore Houston, or generally enjoy these kinds of stories – but even they will leave disappointed, since there seems to be very little real justification for this film to exist outside of its intent to make a profit. There is nothing done here that could not be achieved in a well-made documentary, especially since the key scenes here are just recreations of Houston’s iconic music videos and live performances – these are the most electrifying moments in the film, and that’s solely based on Ackie’s prowess in mimicking Houston enough to make it seem like the late icon was appearing before us – and yet, Houston’s rise and fall was recent enough for enough footage to exist to make a documentary, which would have likely been far more respectful and interesting, especially since it would be able to dive into the more important subjects, rather than being the worst version of a jukebox musical imaginable, a melodramatic jumble of ideas that exists solely to remind us of why Houston was an icon – but this itself begs the question of when she stopped being known as one of our generation’s greatest artists, since she remains a global icon, and none of us needed the reminder, and we could’ve done without the misguided attempts at showing her struggles, as if there was any value in exploiting the life and death of a true original, who deserved so much better than this soulless and vapid attempt at a film.