Effie White, Deena Jones, and Lorrell Robinson - three friends from Chicago - are a promising singing trio called The Dreamettes. Accompanied by their songwriter C.C. White (Effie's brother), they travel to New York to compete in a talent show at the Apollo Theatre. Although the girls lose this first bid for fame, their talent attracts an ambitious manager by the name of Curtis Taylor, Jr., who uses unscrupulous tactics to move the girls from backup singers of superstar James "Thunder" Early to superstars of their own. Curtis reshapes the group to "crossover" from R & B to the lucrative pop music scene. Lead singer Effie gets replaced by the more attractive Deena and is eventually dropped from the trio. The group evolves into a more sophisticated group, The Dreams, with a lighter sound and chic look. They successfully attract a "whiter" audience and The Dreams rise to international stardom. The money, fame, and adulation, however, doesn't bring them happiness.

One of the biggest praises that you can give to a movie even loosely based on actual or real events is that it makes you want to go home and research the true events it is based on. That was very true about Dreamgirls, which is based on the 1981 Broadway Musical, which was loosely based on the Supremes the most successful American 1960's group. I have to admit the first thing I did when I got home from seeing Dreamgirls was to google the Supremes and see how close the movie was to the actual events that had inspired it and seeing a lot of similarities all the while seeing all the deviations in story and history. I have to admit I hadn't know that much about the Supremes or what they had gone through to achieve their success and the movie made me curious enough to want to know more about them and what they had done and that is worth the movie right there, a movie you enjoy enough to want to find out more about its characters and there stories.

In addition to a mini history music lesson you are also treated to some of the feel and musical styling of the 1960's from the soulful stylings of James Brown to the poppy and infectious sounds of the Supremes and the Temptations. The music of Dreamgirls can be described as just that infectious as it draws you and keeps you enthralled by its stylings. While the music isn't the music of the Supremes, it is pretty close and it has that feel and style that made the Supremes so successful. The plot is rich and it is wrapped in musical performance after musical that keeps the story moving without losing its audience.

Eddie Murphy does truly steal the show as James "Thunder" Early who is a mixture of James Brown, Little Richard and Marvin Gaye all wrapped into this mournful and depressed man of soul who is forced to change his style to something more popular but just that much less James Early. Beyonce Knowles does a good job as well as playing Diana Ross who finds herself cast to the front of what would become one of the most successful bands of the 1960's. And while I have seen a lot of praise for Jennifer Hudson I wasn't that overly impressed by her performance as Effie the once frontrunner of the Dreams who finds herself cast off for the prettier and more smooth sounding Deena Jones. She was ok but that's where I would leave it at, ok. She has a great singing voice but so did Beyonce and she does nothing to really outshine her musically or acting wise much like I imagine Florence Ballard never really outshone Diana Ross.

Grade: B