Behind the Burly Q

The best commentator is Alda, whose rueful memories of being raised as a boy in burlesque are the film's highlight. "It was a form of abuse," he says of those days, but without rancor. It was, after all, the only childhood he knew.

The women's outspoken commentaries prove consistently colorful and their long-ago stripteases -- feathers flying, tassels spinning -- still pack a sensual, sassy, what-the-hell punch.

Leslie Zemeckis's slightly ramshackle but utterly entertaining Behind the Burly Q is a painstakingly researched love letter to the women and men who once made up the community of burlesque performers.

A love note to '30s-era burlesque that plays best for those already invested enough in the milieu to hang on every word of aged strippers.

Behind the Burly Q traces that history all the way back to the early part of the 20th century, but doesn't really come into its own until Zemeckis can interview the stars themselves rather than their children.

You hear some nostalgia, but with most of them you don't get the idea that if they had the chance they'd do it all again.

The sauciest of anecdotes are illustrated with faded vintage photos, all tiresomely filtered through the Ken Burns roving-cam effect and making for one chaste and unsexy cultural portrait--the biggest tease of them all.