Weekend: Also in theaters

Also in theaters

By Times staff

A really big screen debut

'N Sync: Bigger Than Live (Not rated, probably G) (48 min.) -- Let's see the Backstreet Boys top this. The pop music stars collectively known as 'N Sync have a concert movie arriving this weekend, but not the usual kind. Bigger Than Live is presented in the IMAX format, meaning each note gets pumped through 50,000 watts of multichannel audio while the performers appear on 10,500 square feet of screen.

Pinch me, I'm dreaming.

Seriously, 'N Sync fans will love this movie, a greatest hits package culled from stops on the group's No Strings Attached tour in 2000. Nothing fancy, except for their dance steps. Just a pop music phenomenon and a few thousand of their loudest fans cheering each choreographed move. Oh, and some backstage footage of the boys doing what they like to do between shows. You know, playing billiards and looking cute. No debauchery attached.

The playlist features nine songs including Bye Bye Bye, This I Promise You, It's Gonna Be Me and Digital Get Down, all capably harmonized and most of them energized by synth-pop dynamics. The highlight though, at least to these aged ears, is an a capella version of I Thought She Knew recalling street corner serenades from the Motown era. Say what you will about 'N Sync and its celebrity, but these singers know and respect roots.

Nothing about the cinematography is remarkable except one song when the group rides a hydraulic stage into the audience's midst and cameras can't keep them in frame. It looks like a sequence that a more discerning filmmaker would have attempted again (the movie utilizes four concerts) or dumped altogether. And the audio technicians could have toned down the volume on crowd reactions; the squeals and screams are a constant distraction from the music. Or maybe that's the idea.

Opens Saturday and continues through July 14 at the IMAX Dome Theater at the Museum of Science and Industry, 4801 E Fowler Ave. in Tampa. B