Hairspray 髮膠明星夢

Based on the recent Broadway musical — which was itself an adaptation of director John Waters’ 1988 cult flick about a girl’s spiritual and intellectual awakening with the help of an aerosol can — the most recent incarnation stands on its own two feet, thanks to director and choreographer Adam Shankman’s smart moves behind the camera. (Waters and original star Ricki Lake give their blessings to the new production in the form of cameos.)

The star-studded cast, which includes, among others, John Travolta — in drag and a fat suit — helps, too. Travolta features prominently in the marketing for “Hairspray,” but the picture really belongs to newcomer Nikki Blonsky, playing Tracy Turnblad, an early 1960s teenager who yearns for fame and fortune. Travolta, with an odd accent and bad wig, plays Edna Turnblad, Tracy’s disapproving mother. Mr. Turnblad (Christopher Walken) offers his daughter more encouragement. “You gotta think big to be big,” dad says.

Tracy finds liberation through singing and shaking her hips. “When I start to dance, I’m a movie star,” Tracy says in “Good Morning Baltimore,” that glorious opening set. “Don’t want to wait one more moment for my life to start.”

Her ultimate goal is to become a dancer on “The Corny Collins Show,” a local afterschool music program that toplines a cast of attractive teenagers with some fancy footwork. Unfortunately for her, Tracy is short and very much plus-sized in a world that values more conventionally proportioned beauty. That means most of her peers view Tracy’s ambition with outright disbelief and a barely disguised disdain.

In particular, “Corny Collins” producer Velma Von

Tussle (Michelle Pfeiffer) considers Tracy a threat to everything she’s worked so hard to establish, namely a traditional, middle-class and distinctly white-bred world.

Eventually Tracy’s quest becomes entangled with the struggle for racial equality for the city’s black residents, represented by Motormouth Maybelle (Queen Latifah) and her son, smooth mover Seaweed (Elijah Kelley). By its feel-good finale, which takes place during the crowning of the city’s Miss Teenage Hairspray, the picture has granted Tracy her dream, given Baltimore racial integration, and hit so many high notes you’ll be slightly dizzy.

To be sure, some of the numbers go on too long, including a protest march led by Latifah that becomes a bit too self-righteous. Another extended interlude that could have used some generous editing sees Travolta and Walken’s longtime couple renewing their marital spark.

Throughout it all, though, director Shank-man never loses a grip on the picture’s mood and tone. The filmmaker does a delicate, deft job of balancing the characters’ endearing optimism and complete lack of cynicism with a wink-wink, postmodern knowingness. This is a time and place where teens haven’t yet adopted that disaffected ennui that passes for cool these days, where pregnant women still smoke without shame, and where local TV is as big as the pond gets. It’s a more earnest era, without the irony or sarcasm, but one that’s about to undergo a tumultuous upheaval.

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