Mamma Mia! Here they go again - the Abba industry is making that perilous move from hit stage musical to the big screen. Why? For Money, Money, Money, of course. Though an Abba fan, I admit I wasn’t looking forward to this film. I told myself to stop moaning and be a Super Trouper. After all, it has those songs and a good cast; how can I resist it? Fifteen minutes into the film, a distressed voice inside my head cried: SOS. Could it be that, When All Is Said and Done, the infallible Abba industry, with its Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! mentality, has finally met its Waterloo?

Mamma Mia! promises pure frothy fun - but, even with plenty of sun, sea, sex, hunky men and Abba hits, Phyllida Lloyd’s film has all the fizz of flat champagne. I can imagine that seeing it on the stage might be fun, what with the audience on its feet and everyone singing along. In the move to the big screen, however, the communal intimacy of the theatre, along with the energy and exuberance of a live musical performance, has been lost. This is a big, bland, soulless slab of Abba merchandise.

Mamma Mia! is set on a beautiful Greek island, where Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) lives with her single mother, Donna (Meryl Streep), in the hotel they run. Sophie is about to get married, so she invites three men - Sam (Pierce Brosnan), Bill (Stellan Skarsgard) and Harry (Colin Firth) - in the hope of discovering which one is her father. Naturally, mum is not pleased by their surprise appearance.

This story line never realises its potential for pathos or comedy, because all three men are cardboard cutouts. But Donna and her old friends (Julie Walters, Christine Baranski) are just as bad. The spectacle of these middle-aged women, in Abba-esque costumes, giggling and indulging in girlie antics as they murder Dancing Queen, is grotesque. This is not ageism or sexism, for middle-aged men who headbang to Bohemian Rhapsody are no better.

Okay, musicals are never really about stories or characters: the stars are always the songs. So, how do those Abba classics stand up? Not well. One of the great myths of popular culture is that Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, the group’s writing team, were great masters of the pop song. They weren’t. Their genius lay less in the songs than in the creation of that Abba sound. That’s why nobody covers their songs the way they do Lennon and McCartney.

As for the musical performances, it’s like watching one of those “talent” competitions featuring B-list celebrities dancing or singing. Nobody expects the celebrity to be great, but if they can just about carry a tune, the public is impressed. Streep, making her debut in a fully fledged musical, gives it a shot and gets an A for effort. But she is no singer, so she has to act out the emotions her voice can’t convey. Firth acquits himself well (Our Last Summer), but Brosnan doing SOS is a crime against popular music.

Using off-the-peg pop hits to carry your narrative is also problematic. When Streep does The Winner Takes It All, she sings: “I was a fool/Playing by the rules.” It doesn’t fit, because Donna is a woman who never played by the rules. You will have more fun getting hammered at the local karaoke bar and singing Dancing Queen with friends.

PG, 108 mins

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