MIXED MEDIA : A VIDEO SPECIAL : <i> Rated on a scale of one star (poor) to five (a classic).</i> : GEORGE MICHAEL : “George Michael” <i> CMV ($19.98)</i> **

If you didn’t like Michael’s new album, “Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1,” you’ll probably hate this hourlong documentary made up of concert footage, video clips and interviews. It’s all about the new George Michael--the sensitive, suffering soul who’s so upset at the trials of being a multimillionaire superstar that he had to record a whole album about his plight. He shuns the old Michael, who specialized in sexy dance tracks.

If you care about the new music, this video does give insight into why Michael turned his back on the dance-music audience to do the “Prejudice” material. Michael, it turns out, simply aches to be taken seriously. The problem is that pop music’s upper crust looks down on dance-music artists. Michael did this melodramatic album of ballads because he realized that as long as he was working in that genre, he’d never get any respect.

On this video, Michael goes all out to appear bright and sensitive. But his anguish is so overdramatized that you’ll find yourself shouting, “Come off it, George!” Cinematically, this ambitious, expertly edited, shot and lit documentary puts most long-form music videos to shame. But if you’re an old fan, most of its content is hard to swallow.