Starring Aubrey Peeples and Juliette Lewis. Rated G. Now playing.

How can a dressup party with this much glitter makeup and hair dye preach the importance of being the real you?

That is the nagging question amid the mixed messages and mountains of sparkle powder in Jem and the Holograms, the bizarre, only intermittently fun adaptation of the 1980s cartoon.

Transporting the animated series to the YouTube generation, it follows Jerrica Benton after she videotapes a song she performs as pink-wigged “Jem”. Her sister posts it on the Internet, it goes viral, and a star is born.

The instant fame is a situation that John M. Chu’s overlong movie can’t quite decide if it wants to deride or celebrate. Jem and her sisters form a band, instantly being granted their own rock-star mansion, makeup and designer-outfit freebies, and soldout concert halls. It’s not the usual route to music-industry success, but this is not a flick that’s interested in realism—though lead actor Aubrey Peeples does boast some real vocal chops on the generically poppy songs.

What’s confusing here is the way the movie glorifies her fame, but focuses on her identity crisis. You keep waiting for Jem to reveal her true self to the world, casting off costumes that look like a Party Bazaar explosion. Don’t hold your breath.

Its best moments come when the movie strays off the grid—after a mini-robot Jerrica’s late father invented comes to life, or when the film splices in real YouTube DIYers to provide the percussive soundtrack.

Other than that, there’s hunky Ryan Guzman to pine after, and the much-missed Juliette Lewis as a fantastically harsh record-label queen.

Alas, a spirited appearance by Molly Ringwald as Jerrica’s beloved Aunt Bailey only serves to remind us how good teen movies used to be—when they weren’t all about being Pretty in Pink Hair.