Pitch Perfect

A college student (Anna Kendrick) is dragooned into a campus a capella singing group, where her experimental nature clashes with the conservative style of the group’s self-appointed leader (Anna Camp). Kay Cannon’s script (based, ever so loosely, on a book by Mickey Rapkin) parodies, by faithful imitation, the silly adolescent soap opera of Glee, with plenty of sly winks at the audience, congratulating them on having such a knowing postmodern sense of humor. Broadly directed by Jason Moore, the story grows tiresome before long; what redeems the movie is the musical numbers, energetically danced and sung, hopefully (but maybe not) in the actors’ own voices. (Oddly enough, though, Kendrick and Camp’s group doesn’t sing a capella at the climactic competition: It’s accompanied by an unseen percussionist.)