By Sam MillerSenior Staff Writer

It became apparent to me early on (during the trailers before thefeature) that not even Steve Vai, Ralph Macchio and a blisteringguitar duel finale could save Britney Spears’ screen debut,Crossroads, from being the utter pile it is. Unfortunately, the popmusic zombies we call 14-year-old girls will flock to Crossroads likehungry seabirds to the bloated corpse of a beached whale.

Crossroads tells the story of Lucy (Spears), an intelligent younglady with a studio-altered singing voice who’s led a sheltered life.Lucy is the portrait of virginal high school awkwardness save for thefact she looks neither awkward nor virginal. Her near-brush withwomanhood comes in the form of a playful rendezvous with her labpartner who looks like the poor woman’s Jason Schwartzman.

With two old childhood friends with whom she’s barely interactedsince pre-pubescence (Zoe Saldana as a sassy black beauty queen andTaryn Manning as sassy trailer trash) and an unshaven opportunisticsexual predator/ex-con (a sassily unshaven Anson Mount), this quartetof twenty-something actors pretending to be high-schoolers go on aroad trip from Georgia to California; a coast-to-coast journey ofself-discovery, friendship and clich