December 27, 2014 -- This musical, based on the Steven Sondheim and James Lapine play features some good performances, but the story is a disaster. The story is a mashup of the fairy tales of Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk, Rapunzel and Little Red Riding Hood. Like the original Grimm's Fairy Tales, these are dark stories of hatred, revenge, death and disfigurement. It's a fairy tale all right, but a pretty cynical one.

The handsome prince (played by Chris Pine of “Star Trek”) searches for and finds Cinderalla (Anna Kendrick of “Perfect Pitch”) sans the glass slippers, then some crazy stuff happens between those two. The wicked witch (Meryl Streep) gets the baker and his wife (James Corden of “Begin Again” and Emily Blunt of “Edge of Tomorrow”) to track down some magical objects in order to remove an evil spell. Crazy stuff happens after this, too.

Jack (Daniel Huttlestone of “Les Misérables”) climbs the beanstalk and steals gold from giants, who pursue him back to the earth to cause a lot of trouble. Rapunzel (Mackenzie Mauzy) and her handsome prince (Billy Magnussen) also have some adventures, related to some of these other characters.

Suffice it to say the story seems more like a series of random, unrelated events which are forced together in a rather clumsy fashion. There was a natural point to end this story, but it goes on for another half hour or so, pretty much exploding the story line established in the first half of the film.

The performances are good, however. I was impressed with the singing ability of some of these actors who are not known for their singing ability. Johnny Depp, who plays the Wolf, gives a wonderful performance. Anna Kendrick does a fine job of singing and acting, but her character does things that make no sense at times. Chris Pine is good as the somewhat comical, thick-headed prince, and delivers the movie's best comic line. Meryl Streep gives her usual great performance too. The music is adequate, but not exceptional.

The main problem is the story, which falls apart and the seams. It is like a deconstruction of fairy tales. This reminds me of the evil stories for children that the Saturday Night Live character “Mr. Mike” (Michael O'Donoghue) used to tell, like “The Little Engine that Died.” Instead of “I think I can,” it is “Oh my God! Oh my God” as the little engine fails to climb the hill rolls backwards out of control, killing everybody in the train station. Funny, but sick.

As is the case in most movies, it is not the actors who are at fault here. The problem is in the writing. This story is a train wreck, just plain irritating. This film rates a C. I want my money back.

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