By the time she died of a heroin overdose at the age of 44 on July 17, 1959, Billie Holiday (real name: Eleanora Fagan Gough, a.k.a., "Lady Day") was already a show business legend: a singer of great talent and emotional power also notorious for a tragic, tortured personal life. Death transformed the legend into romantic myth and, sooner or later, a cinematic biopic was inevitable. Unfortunately, the biopic that did emerge thirteen years after Lady Day's demise proved to be a bad, bombastic film. Much that is wrong with 'Lady Sings the Blues' can be traced to Motown Records mogul Berry Gordy's heavy-handed involvement (including total financing to the tune of $3.5 million). His screen writing team—Chris Clark, Suzanne de Passe, and Terence McCloy—were all Gordy cronies but none of them had written a screenplay before. Also highly suspect was the film's primary source material: Billie Holiday's alleged autobiography, co-authored with hack writer William F. Dufty: 'Lady Sings the Blues' (Doubleday, 1956). Holiday's own account of her life was filled with fabrications that the screenwriters blithely took at face value. No matter; the intent of the movie all along was not to serve historical accuracy but to function as the ultimate prestige star vehicle for Gordy's protégé Diana Ross, former Supremes lead singer, who had just embarked on a solo recording and film career and demanded that Gordy give her the juicy part of Lady Day. The fact that Ross had very little acting experience and did not look or sound anything like Billie Holiday, prompted critics to wonder aloud if she could carry the film. Surprisingly, she could, and did—after a fashion. Purely as melodrama, 'Lady' is a powerful experience. Though graced by numerous artistic triumphs, Billie Holiday's life was, without question, a nightmare roller coaster of drug addiction and withdrawal, police troubles, racial victimization, and unending bouts of sexual and emotional abuse by the men in her life, both intimates and strangers. In its clumsy, single-minded zeal to capture all the suffering and angst, the film goes too far. When all is said and done Diana Ross's Billie Holiday is the consummate victim-martyr and little else. Indeed, her spiritual and emotional pain is so constant, loud, intense, and insistent that the viewer drifts from stunned empathy, to pity, to compassion fatigue, to something akin to post-traumatic stress disorder. Striving with great earnestness for tragedy, 'Lady Sings the Blues' is finally nothing more than a protracted exercise in hysterical bathos. At first blush, the film was considered a great one in some quarters. Critics were politely wary but the public ate it up and the Motion Picture Academy—always attuned to popular sentiment—bestowed five 1973 Oscar nominations. The soundtrack album was a big hit as well. After 'Lady' failed to win any Oscars, it became apparent that the initial response had been overblown, much like the movie itself. Billy Dee Williams plays Holiday's husband, Louis McKay, and legendary comic Richard Pryer does a fine turn as Holiday's pianist but the show belongs almost entirely to Ross. VHS (1996) and DVD (2005).

The first question that would run across the mind of anyone who'd watch this movie is: "Can Diana Ross act?" The answer, I'm glad to say, is an unequivocal "Yes." And I think that's what the director wanted to clear up right from the very first scene, with a flash forward to Billie Holiday's drug bust while the credits were still on. Ms. Ross, devoid of make-up and with "crazy hair," put on an extremely convincing performance of heroin (or coke) withdrawal, replete with howling.

Her performance is the highlight of the movie, which unfortunately felt like it ran way too long, and I found myself constantly checking the run time. It wasn't bad as a musical. As I had read previously, Ms. Ross didn't seek to imitate Billie Holiday's style, and instead created a distinct and appropriate - yet similar - jazz style of her own just for the movie (check out "Good Morning Heartache"), and I, being a fan, didn't mind the song interludes.

What dragged the movie was the constant focus on Holiday's drug addiction (to showcase more of Ms. Ross's acting?). It felt like there was scene after scene of her being drug-addled, whining, and screaming, which began to abrade after a while. It's too bad, since with better direction and screenplay, coupled with Ms. Ross's capable acting and singing, this could've been one of the truly great musical biopics.

There is no question that no matter how extreme in the past or future Miss. Ross has been or will be (tantrums, bad albums, phoniness, bad publicity, touch me, don't touch me), she will always have this performance to look back on as a moment where everything worked perfectly.

The film is imperfect. Flawed. It could have been more realistic, more harrowing, and less hollywood-fied. Had it been, and had Motown not been so intent on proving itself as a major film force, she would have won the Oscar without question. The rumor had always been that in terms of voting it was "this close" as they say.

Even though she did not win, we are still left with a performance of depth, passion and layers that could only be described as magnificent in an experienced actress. In a neophyte, as Miss. Ross was at the time, it is stunning.

As a singer, She never before or since has sounded as good. The voice, while not really like Billie Holiday, just glows. Her musicality, intonation and idiomatic phrasing indicated a whole type of music she could have sung had she chosen too.

Watch it for her. It will make you think more kindly towards her the next time she, well, acts like Miss. Ross!