Puerto Rican singer Hector Lavoe rode the boom in Latin music in New York during the '70s. It was an extremely creative period driven by Latin-American musicians who took Cuban rhythms and added elements of African American music to create a sizzling, urban sound called salsa.

Lavoe had a reedy, nasal voice but his prowess as a lyrical improviser, reflecting the lives of his urban audience, won him faithful fans. His chronic drug addiction only added to the legend. It's not surprising that Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony, two American singers of Puerto Rican descent, should be drawn to such a project. What is surprising is that the results should be so flat.

The concert scenes are spectacular — Anthony sounds better than Lavoe ever did — and the new productions of Lavoe's classic songs are inspired. But in between the concert recreations, the events of Lavoe's tragic life (he died of AIDS-related illnesses at the age of 46) unfold in a succession of dismal vignettes.

The film may be called El Cantante (the singer) but it focuses most of its attention on the relationship between Lavoe and his unlikeable wife, Puchi (Lopez, pictured with Anthony), relegating its observations about the birth of salsa to little more than a footnote. It must have been an exciting time to be in New York — and to be at the centre of a creative wave — but Lavoe's high times just seem like a chore. There is a good film here, struggling to get out. Perhaps it will arrive with the next biopic of Lavoe, due later this year.