In Blues Brothers 2000, John Landis's sequel to his 1980 music/comedy/car crash extravaganza, the vibrant music of the rhythm and blues legends inhabiting the movie can do nothing to elevate the proceedings from a fourth-rate storyline plagued by tepid slapstick and obligatory car wrecks. The result is to demean both the songs and the performers, degrading true quality in the service of crap.

Blues Brothers 2000 takes up where The Blues Brothers left off. Eighteen years later, Elwood Blues (Dan Aykroyd) is released from an Illinois prison for causing the carnage and mass destruction that occurred in the original Blues Brothers installment. Informed of the death of his brother Jake (Jake, of course, was played by John Belushi and had really been dead for a while), Elwood stops at a used government vehicle graveyard determined to get a "full-size Ford police package" and reform the band. Ultimately, Elwood slaps the band back together with second stringers like Mighty Mac McTeer (John Goodman), a ten-year-old runt named Buster (J. Evan Bonifant), and by-the-books copper Cabel (Joe Morton). And, of course, the new Blues Brothers are pursued, not only by the Illinois State Police, but also by the FBI, right wing militia, and the Russian mob. Finally, at a tent revival meeting presided over by James Brown and Sam Moore doing "John the Revelator," Cabel recaptures his blues roots and rises into the sky, transformed into a Blues Brother screaming, "The calling of the blood. I understand. This is my God-given destiny!"

But wait. There's more. Once the band is ready to go and Cabel is born-again, Elwood gets them a gig at a creepy, decaying Louisiana estate, lorded over by a 130-year-old voodoo priestess (Erykah Badu), where the Blues Brothers engage in a battle of the bands with a superstar band called The Louisiana Gator Boys Band and blow the lid off the joint.

Landis and Aykroyd tote out the old 1980 formula (which was growing whiskers even back then) and simply repeat it. Landis cumbersomely pads out this hoary story with various musical numbers that, in most cases, stop the story cold (for which we are grateful). But it becomes a chore to wait until Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Eddie Floyd, or Wilson Pickett comes along to entertain us. This gumbo would be much more successful as a cable music special instead of the brutal two-hour movie that it is.

That leaves the music. Despite the cheesy choreography and Landis's off-hand editing of the musical numbers (he keeps cutting away in mid-song to reaction shots of Elwood), the screen ignites during the battle of the bands finale. The Louisiana Gator Boys Band-- consisting of a jaw-dropping roster of greats including B.B. King, Eric Clapton, Dr. John, Bo Diddley, Issac Hayes, Steve Winwood, Travis Tritt, and Clarence Clemons -- perform "How Blue Can You Get?" and tear the place apart. And for that alone, Blues Brothers 2000 may actually be worth checking out.