Entertainment

Don’t bring in ’da ‘Noise’

A showdown between Dolly Parton in her ’80s prime and Queen Latifah as dueling divas might have made the silly musical “Joyful Noise’’ far more of a campy guilty pleasure than it actually turns out to be.

When Latifah’s character, Vi Rose, cites the “procedures’’ that Parton’s G.G. has had during the inevitable catfight, it would be a lot funnier if the wizened little music legend didn’t look like a Madame Tussauds’ exhibit that was left out in the noonday sun.

G.G. tells the outsized Vi Rose that her surgeon also does liposuction, but it’s hardly a fair fight under the circumstances.

Latifah, a formidable actress who’s almost always better than her movies, easily dominates this hokey cross between “Glee’’ and “Sister Act’’ centering on the church choir in a small Georgia town that’s reeling from the recession and where people tend to talk in aphorisms.

When her husband, the longtime choirmaster, dies suddenly, G.G. — the church’s main financial supporter — is upset when the minister (Courtney B. Vance) chooses Vi Rose instead of her as his successor.

Their conflict is exacerbated when G.G.’s bad-boy grandson Randy (Jeremy Jordan, late of Broadway’s “Bonnie & Clyde’’) turns up and starts romancing Vi Rose’s rebellious daughter Olivia (Keke Palmer).

Randy joins the choir and, with his grandmother’s encouragement, tries to get the increasingly annoyed Vi Rose to update its music in time for an annual national competition in Los Angeles.

You can pretty much guess the rest, which is not necessarily a serious criticism for this type of movie.

There is also a subplot about Vi Rose’s father, a soldier stationed at a distant Army base, and another one about Vi Rose’s autistic adolescent son (Dexter Darden), who seems to have an unrequited crush on his new pal Randy.

Todd Graff, who wrote and directed a great little indie called “Camp’’ a decade ago, handles these melodramatics and the Vi Rose-G.G. showdown (in a restaurant) with less panache than the musical numbers.

You might wonder how many church choirs are really performing Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror,’’ or “Walk Away Renée’’ or the other songs in the pop-heavy score.

Latifah goes the more traditional route with a lovely “Fix Me Jesus,’’ but it’s Parton who manages to deliver the musical coup de grace in “Joyful Noise.’’

She joins Kris Kristofferson — as the ghost of G.G.’s late husband — for a knockout duet of “From Here to the Moon and Back,’’ which Parton wrote.