Ray (15, 152mins) Drama. Jamie Foxx, Kerry Washington, Regina King, Aunjanue Ellis, Sharon Warren, Clifton Powell, Harry Lennix, Bokeem Woodbine. Released: January 21 (UK & Ireland)

THE late Ray Charles once quipped: "I never wanted to be famous. I only wanted to be great."

Taylor Hackford's measured if overlong biopic has similarly lofty aspiration.

Unlike the live-wire American pianist and singer on whom it is based, Ray doesn't always hit the emotional high notes, despite a sensational lead performance from Jamie Foxx that will surely be rewarded with the Academy Award for Best Actor.

Written by James L White, Ray charts the musician's meteoric rise to fame, beginning with his traumatic childhood in '30s Florida.

The five-year-old Ray watches helplessly as his young brother drowns in a bathtub, rooted to the spot while his mother Aretha (Warren) glimpses the unfolding tragedy and screams for help.

Two years later, at the age of seven, he goes blind.

"I'll show you how to do something once," Aretha soothes him, "I'll help you if you mess up twice, but the third time you own your own. Cause that's how it is in the world."

The film fast-forwards to the swinging '50s where Ray (Foxx) is first introduced to the allure of drugs on the burgeoning music club scene, culminating in the mid-'60s when the singer finally weans himself off cocaine, but not before his support of the civil rights movement leads to a concert ban in Georgia.

Refreshingly, Hackford's film doesn't relive the past through rose-tinted glasses: Charles is not portrayed as a saint by any means, such as his penchant for sleeping around behind the back of his steadfast wife Della (Washington).

His two affairs, with singer Ann Fisher (Ellis) and Margie Hendricks (King) from his backing group The Raelettes, run the course of much of the two-and-a-half hours.

Foxx is riveting, lip-synching beautifully to Charles's original recordings and effortlessly capturing the charisma and energy of the man.

It's a tour-de-force performance, not least because Foxx's eyes - the windows to his soul - are concealed behind sunglasses for almost the entire film.

He has to rely on his physicality and the richness of screenwriter White's words to convey the maelstrom of emotions within Ray, which frequently overflowed into his music.

Warren dazzles in her few minutes of screen time and King, Ellis and Washington bring sensuality and spark to the three women in Ray's self-destructive life.

Not once does the film beg us to feel pity for the musician because of his physical impairment - he survived because he had to.

Only a final flashback - Ray's beyond-the-grave reconciliation with his mother and dead brother - rings hollow.

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