MUMBAI: A remake of the 1980 film Fame released on Friday is riding a lucrative wave of song-and-dance shows on the big and small screen.

Aimed squarely at young girls, the 2009 version of New York performing arts high school students hoping to live their dreams is as squeaky-clean as director Alan Parker‘s original was gritty.

Updated with rap tunes and hip-hop choreography, the new version barely grazes issues of poverty, sexual exploitation and drugs that lay beneath the exuberance of Fame almost 30 years ago.

The remake seeks to tap into the money-spinning teen market blazed by Disney‘s $1 billion-plus High School Musical franchise, the worldwide Idol TV talent show franchise and the feature adaptation of Mamma Mia! that was the fifth-biggest movie of 2008 with global ticket sales of $609 million.