Pitch Perfect 3 fails to hit the right notes despite all-star cast

REVIEW: It’s got an all-star cast and it’s going gangbusters at the US box office. So does the musical-comedy Pitch Perfect 3 live up to the hype or fall flat?

PITCH PERFECT 3 (M)

**

Director: Trish Sie

Starring: Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson, Brittany Snow, Anna Camp

Running time 93 minutes

Verdict: Franchise hits a bum note

EVEN when this synthetic musical medley hits the right emotional notes, it’s hard to shake the feeling that the filmmakers are relying on cinema’s version of Auto-Tune.

In the third — and reportedly final — film in the Pitch Perfect franchise, the Bellas have gone their separate ways after winning the world championship. But post-college life has turned out to be something of a disappointment for the various members of the all-girl a capella group, a disparate bunch who have really only their music in common.

Rebel Wilson and Anna Kendrick return as Fat Amy and Beca.

Beca (played by Anna Kendrick) is working as a producer for a large record company, until she tells one of the label’s minimally talented artists what she really thinks of his latest album. Newly unemployed, she returns to the one-room flat she inexplicably shares with Fat Amy (Rebel Wilson).

Lame jokes run thick and fast in Pitch Perfect 3.

The outspoken Aussie misfit has never had any intention of getting a “real” job. She’s just waiting for her one-woman show Fat Amy Winehouse to take off. Meanwhile Chloe (Brittany Snow) is struggling to keep her head above water at veterinary college.

Dispirited by the compromises of the real world, the Bellas leap at the chance to join a USO tour to play for the troops in Europe.

Venzella Joy Williams, Hannah Fairlight, Ruby Rose and Andy Allo in Pitch Perfect 3.

Outside the insular environment of college, however, their act suddenly comes across as rather minimalist and gauche.

To reconstruct the rivalry that gave focus to the two previous Pitch Perfect instalments, the Bellas vie for the chance to open for DJ Khaled (who underplays himself) in his upcoming arena show. Their competition includes a country and western group, a hip hop duo and an all-female rock band by the name of Evermoist — with jokes as tired as that, Ruby Rose’s frontwoman never stood a chance.

Pitch Perfect 3 fails to hit the right notes.

To further “freshen up” Pitch Perfect 3, the filmmakers add a budding romance between Beca and Khaled’s British manager (Guy Burnet) based primarily on professional respect. Puh-lease! Not even Anna Kendrick can pull that one off.

Wilson fares better in a grafted-on side plot involving Fat Amy’s estranged con artist father (John Lithgow with a dodgy accent). The Australian comedian’s explosive, sausage-thwacking action sequence aboard the Mediterranean yacht where the Bellas are being held captive is outrageously entertaining.

The movie’s off-colour humour only worsens the franchise fatigue.

All the while, the franchise’s patented running commentary from John Michael Higgins and Elizabeth Banks becomes increasingly unhinged. The pair’s off-colour humour is well served by that whiff of desperation, yet one can’t help but feel their tone is informed by the filmmakers themselves as they struggle with the stress fractures caused by franchise fatigue.

Part caper movie, part musical rom-com, part high school reunion, Pitch Perfect 3’s competing

elements fail to harmonise.

OPENS ON JANUARY 1

Originally published as Pitch Perfect 3 fails to hit the right notes despite all-star cast