BOBBY Darin, born Walden Robert Cassotto, became a rock 'n' roll sensation in the 50s with swinging tunes including Dream Lover and Mack The Knife.

Beyond The Sea, Kevin Spacey's second feature as director, traces the entertainer's career from a child (Ullrich) growing up in the Bronx, to an adult (Spacey) whose success in the charts is tempered by a failing marriage to screen starlet Sandra Dee (Bosworth).

Darin's meteoric rise to fame is all the more remarkable because, at the age of seven, rheumatic fever permanently damages his heart.

The outlook is grim: doctors don't expect Bobby to live to the age of 15 so his family - mother Polly (Blethyn), older sister Nina (Aaron) and her husband Charlie (Hoskins) - devote every waking minute to his happiness.

His mother introduces him to the joy of music, an escape from the harsh realities of his illness and life in New York.

Miraculously, Bobby defies all of the medics. By 20, he is working on the nightclub circuit with his manager Steve Blauner (Goodman) and musical director Dick Behrke (Cincotti).

The release of Splish Splash, a song written in just 20 minutes, sends Bobby's star skywards, and he consolidates his new-found fame with an album of standards.

Leaving for Italy to make the film Come September, Bobby falls under the spell of move star Sandra Dee and they are subsequently married, to the intense displeasure of her controlling mother (Scacchi).

Success in the charts and on the big screen, including an Academy Award nomination, puts a strain on the marriage.

The relationship dissolves and, in the late 60s, Bobby seeks a new direction in his life as a political activist, before returning to Vegas to exorcise the demons of his past.

Spacey is sensational in the lead role, singing all of Darin's songs live, rather than lip-synching, and kicking up a storm in the energetic song and dance numbers.

It's a virtuoso performance that almost single-handedly carries the film through two hours.

Bosworth is solid enough, if unspectacular, and there is good support from Goodman, Hoskins et al.

But every frame of the screen is charged with Spacey's magnetic presence.

Beyond The Sea employs a framing device similar to De-Lovely, although it's not as clumsy or intrusive here, engineering a rousing finale.

DAMON SMITH