Rock n’ roll ain’t never gonna die! Yeeeeaaahhhh!
(Don’t tell the pop charts, though, or else they’ll laugh at you.)
Rock n’ roll movies, however, will keep chugging right along, even as trends change the type of rockin’ cinema we can expect. But whether the filmmakers are being reverent or satirical, the devil’s horns will stay raised and necks will cramp up from thrashing to the beat in theaters. Besides, Hollywood hasn’t yet scraped the bottom of the barrel for music biopics, so even if electric guitars and wailing vocals are no longer permitted on the commercial airwaves, we’re still bound to eventually get the silver screen answer to the question of just what was that something of a deep blue hue back in the mid-90s?
And that marks the second reference I’ve made to that group this year, a feat which hasn’t been matched since 1997.
Wanna keep right on rockin’? After checking out the capsule reviews for the eleven flicks below, check out the other two rock-oriented batches on Cinecaps Digest: Rock n’ Roll (Part 1) and Rock n’ Roll (Part 2)*
*Not that well-known Gary Glitter song that sports arenas don’t get to play anymore for, um, reasons.
Airheads (1994)
Directed by Michael Lehmann. Starring Brendan Fraser, Steve Buscemi, Adam Sandler, Joe Mantegna, Michael McKean, Chris Farley, Amy Locane, Ernie Hudson, Nina Siemaszko, Michael Richards, Marshall Bell, Judd Nelson, David Arquette, Reg E. Cathey, Michelle Hurst. [PG-13]
A trio of none-too-bright L.A. metalheads known as The Lone Rangers (“How can you pluralize ‘lone ranger’?”) break into a local radio station to force the DJ to play their demo for exposure, end up taking hostages with water pistols while the police, the media, and overzealous headbangers surround the building. A few too many brain cells are burned out in this decent time-killer, but enthusiastic direction and performances from most of the cast compensate for the lazy scripting. The jokes lack variety, but several land anyway, and even if the whole situation is stretched far beyond the confines of credulity, there’s more affection for the cultural milieu than the average commercial film at the time that orbited a similar youth-oriented lifestyle (even if the protagonists’ brand of hairy hard rock was hardly in vogue anymore by 1994). Harold Ramis appears briefly; cameos range from MTV’s Kurt Loder to Motörhead’s Lemmy Kilmister (and even Beavis and Butthead get involved at one point).
58/100
Cadillac Records (2008)
Directed by Darnell Martin. Starring Adrien Brody, Jeffrey Wright, Columbus Short, Mos Def, Eamonn Walker, Beyoncé Knowles, Cedric the Entertainer, Gabrielle Union, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Eric Bogosian, Tammy Blanchard, Shiloh Fernandez, Jay O. Sanders. [R]
Writer/director Martin is in over his head trying to tell the turbulent story of the rise and fall of Chicago-based Chess Records in the 1950s (along with the incomplete biographies of a slew of artists signed to the label), but who could do it justice in less than two hours? Brody is co-founder Leonard Chess (though, oddly, his brother and other co-founder, Phil (Fernandez), barely even gets acknowledged); Wright is Muddy Waters, the first rising star to sign on; Short embodies the volatile master-of-the-mouth-harp, Little Walter; Walker brings out the deep, booming voice of Howlin’ Wolf; and so on. Fragmented storytelling covers a lot of ground, resulting in personas and storylines being introduced, dropped, sidelined, and reinstated without warning. Most of the cast is satisfactory in their roles (Mos Def being far more so while playing that irascibly problematic sparkplug called Chuck Berry), but they rarely get opportunities to really shine, and the filmmakers don’t quite know what to make of them all—some are barely developed at all, and no attitude ever seems to be taken about their flawed, often messy lives (even the epilogue postscript merely recites dry statistics, as if anyone needed a reminder that all of the featured musicians have been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame). Cameos include Vincent D’Onofrio and Q-Tip.
55/100
Go, Johnny, Go! (1959)
Directed by Paul Landres & Piero Vivarelli. Starring Jimmy Clanton, Sandy Stewart, Alan Freed, Herb Vigran, Chuck Berry, Frank Wilcox, Barbara Wooddell. [G]
Early rock ‘n roll artifact with Freed playing a version of himself that’s looking to make a hot new star out of the mysterious “Johnny Melody” (Clanton), but, gee whiz, they just can’t ever seem to connect. The story is paper-thin and acting stiffer than a guitar neck, but it just barely makes the grade solely as a vehicle for delivering a series of musical performances from a slew of rock stars from the era (Eddie Cochran, Jackie Wilson, the Flamingos, etc.)…even if they are just lip-synched pantomimes of studio recordings. Could’ve been harmless teenybopper fun, but there’s a void of charisma in its leading man, and try as the script might to make him seem a little rebellious—even throwing a brick through a jewelry store window, gasp!—the clumpy and clean-cut kid still makes skim milk look like sriracha. Berry sings and acts, and debuts “Memphis, Tennessee” alongside run-throughs of earlier hits “Little Queenie” and “Johnny B. Goode” (the latter tune is where the movie title comes from); Ritchie Valens plays “Ooh My Head” in his only film appearance—he tragically died a few months before the film’s release. Look for Dave Brubeck playing the piano during one of Berry’s performances.
52/100
Hold On! (1966)
Directed by Arthur Lubin. Starring Peter Noone, Herbert Anderson, Sue Ane Langdon, Bernard Fox, Shelley Fabares, Hortense Petra, Karl Green, Keith Hopwood, Derek Leckenby, Barry Whitwam.
Throwaway vehicle for Merseybeat pop idols Herman’s Hermits in the British Invasion charts-to-cinemas synergy tradition. Plot clothesline is as wispy and fragile as cotton candy: young’uns have voted to put the Herman’s Hermits name onto the next Gemini space capsule, so fuddy-duddy G-man Anderson is assigned to investigate the lads’ worthiness of such an honor. Sketchy sub-plots of a fame-starved actress (Langdon) trying to hitch her post to the band’s publicity wagon and a squeaky-clean romance between frontman “Herman” (Noone) and a generic young blonde (Fabares) are so much filler that there’s barely any effort to resolve them before the end. As for the rest of the band (the Hermits?), they don’t get anything to do but perform and make the occasional walk-on appearance. Of course, it’s all just an excuse to string together several song performances, only a couple of which rate higher than immediately forgettable. Inoffensive entertainment, but utterly uninteresting, too; the comic hijinks are so third-rate that every punchline should be chased by a wah-wah trumpet. No one in their right mind would confuse this thing for A Hard Day’s Night or Help!…but it can’t even reach the “heights” of the one featuring the Dave Clark Five! Songs include “A Must to Avoid,” “Leaning on the Lamp Post,” and the title track.
34/100
Purple Rain (1984)
Directed by Albert Magnoli. Starring Prince, Apollonia, Morris Day, Jill Jones, Jerome Benton, Clarence Williams III, Billy Sparks, Olga Karlatos, Wendy Melvoin, Lisa Coleman. [R]
In his film acting debut, Prince is “the Kid,” a young musician trying to make it big at a local club where he’s in competition with other regular acts. His emotionally turbulent life includes drama with his family, a pretty newcomer on the scene (Apollonia), his band, etc.; music is his outlet, though, and when he’s onstage, he’s electrifying. Prince may not rate much as an actor (aside from inadvertent comedian), but the cat’s got screen presence, even when playing someone who’s not especially likable or interesting outside the club; as for the story he picked as a vehicle for superstardom, it’s built out of underfed clichés and tepid melodrama, but the concert numbers are too exhilarating to care all that much—the star’s “Minnesota Sound” fusion of funk, rock, R&B, and pop is simply irresistible. A few other artists also appear in support, most notably Day, who was amazingly willing to play “himself” as a clownish lout, even ordering one of his bandmate flunkies (Benton) to literally throw an angry woman into a trash bin(!); he and his group, the Time, perform two songs (“Jungle Love,” “The Bird”). Final-to-date Oscar winner in the category of Original Song Score (even though, absurdly, none of the classic tunes—“Let’s Go Crazy,” “When Doves Cry,” “I Would Die 4 U,” the title track, etc.—received individual nods).
67/100
Rock Star (2001)
Directed by Stephen Herek. Starring Mark Wahlberg, Jennifer Aniston, Timothy Spall, Dominic West, Dagmara Domińczyk, Timothy Olyphant, Jason Flemyng, Stephan Jenkins, Matthew Glave. [R]
Superficial, single-chord saga of a hair metal tribute band singer (Wahlberg) getting a once-in-a-lifetime shot at stardom when Steel Dragon, the group he worships, needs a replacement for their just-dropped frontman (Flemyng). But will fame go to his head and will excess derail his relationship with girlfriend Aniston? If you don’t already know the answer to those questions (and have a high tolerance for generic cock rock), maybe you’ll find something fulfilling here, but others will quickly tire of its predictability. A tonal trainwreck that reads as parody with its abundant clichés and pat storytelling, but aside from a few isolated moments (a drag race with the Batmobile, a couple of Spinal Tap-esque throwaways during the end credits, etc.), nothing from the direction or performances suggests that any of ‘em are in on the gag. Wahlberg fails to sell the drive or the devotion to the milieu, and miscast Aniston sticks out like a sore thumb in her underwritten role. The original tunes played by Steel Dragon get tiresome so quickly that the most enjoyable soundtrack selections are the ones that go against the chest-beating grain: Talking Heads and INXS, for example, to say nothing for the in-joke inclusion of a little Marky Mark & the Funky Bunch; another potential in-joke is the meta-“self-own” found in a late film lyric: “Stayed for drama, though you’ve paid for a comedy.” Liberally inspired by the story of Judas Priest, which also replaced their frontman (Rob Halford) with a “fan” who proved to have the pipes (Tim “Ripper” Owens). Several real life musicians (Jenkins, Zakk Wylde, Jason Bonham, etc.) have supporting roles and bit parts.
40/100
The Runaways (2010)
Directed by Floria Sigismondi. Starring Dakota Fanning, Kristen Stewart, Michael Shannon, Riley Keough, Scout Taylor-Compton, Stella Maeve, Alia Shawkat, Johnny Lewis. [R]
Heavily-dramatized coming-of-ager based on the rise and fall of the first major all-girl punk rock band, the Runaways, the brain child of record producer Kim Fowley (Shannon), who’s portrayed as a sleazy, exploitative opportunist. Film focuses on street-tough guitarist Joan Jett (Stewart) and uncertain singer Cherie Currie (Fanning)—who’s sold by Fowley’s PR machine as sex kitten jailbait—while the rest of the band are barely even given names (with Jett as a producer and writer/director Sigismondi’s script being loosely based off Currie’s memoir, this isn’t much of a surprise, but the imbalance is still frustrating). Energetic and packed with snarling rock n’ roll tunes, but also narrow, shallow, and all-too-familiar; solid acting and raunchy guitars can only do so much with the sort of story that’s been told again and again, especially one with the sort of gaps that reek of dramatic license rewrites and convenience (e.g., same-sex relations are intimated and then immediately dropped multiple times). The scene of Fowley using word association to come up with the title of the group’s signature song, “Cherry Bomb,” on the fly is laugh-out-loud funny…even though that’s clearly not the reaction the filmmakers were aiming for. Real-life Runaways bassist Jackie Fuchs declined to release her rights, so the bass player shown onscreen is named Robin (Shawkat).
60/100
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978)
Directed by Michael Schultz. Starring George Burns, the Bee Gees, Peter Frampton, Sandy Farina, Frankie Howerd, Dianne Steinberg, Donald Pleasence, Steve Martin, Alice Cooper, Paul Nicholas. [PG]
One of those movie disasters that’s so impossible to believe it was ever greenlit that it’s assumed it only existed in a bad dream…but, no, it actually happened (other examples include Theodore Rex, Soul Man, and the Star Wars Holiday Special). Here it is: two interminable hours of Beatles songs without the Beatles on hand to perform them, all crammed into a senseless rock opera-esque fantasy “story,” grinding at a deadening pace and full of ugly, chaotic visuals. An endless string of cringe-worthy musical numbers of beloved rock songs butchered by the likes of the Bee Gees, Peter Frampton, Alice Cooper, Sandy Farina, and more; not even an appearance from Steve Martin and a barely tolerable Top 40 cover of “Come Together” by Aerosmith make it even remotely worth the effort. Providing the occasional bit of narration that tries to hold this Frankenstein’s monster of a trainwreck together is Burns, completely wasted in a non-role, and probably literally wasted himself when he agreed to sing “Fixing a Hole.” So, if you feel like your life is empty without hearing George Burns sing “Fixing a Hole,” then, well…still skip it.
4/100
Smithereens (1982)
Directed by Susan Seidelman. Starring Susan Berman, Brad Rijn, Richard Hell, Nada Despotovich, Roger Jett, Kitty Summerall. [R]
Wannabe punk rocker Wren (Berman) is an aimless, frustrating, self-absorbed, relentless figure in the flagging New York scene…but also somewhat fascinating. Her latch-and-release method doesn’t earn her comfortable devotion among a couple of interchangeable gents that either don’t play hard to get or don’t play at all, but this is a girl bound to go nowhere, incapable of growth or self-awareness—it’s her refusal to admit defeat that gives purpose to the crudely arty and low-energy guerrilla-style filmmaking. Soundtrack includes a couple of tunes from co-star Richard Hell (and the Voidoids), but is dominated by the urgent, shivery melodies of jangly post-punk band, The Feelies. Film debut for director Seidelman (she also co-wrote and co-produced); ditto most of the cast.
64/100
This Is Spinal Tap (1984)
Directed by Rob Reiner. Starring Michael McKean, Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer, Tony Hendra, Rob Reiner, June Chadwick, R. J. Parnell, David Kaff, Fran Drescher, Patrick Macnee. [R]
Hysterical rock mockumentary (or mock rockumentary) where filmmaker Marty Di Bergi (Reiner) and crew follow around aging English heavy metal band Spinal Tap during their first US tour in the better part of a decade, which goes disastrously despite the delusional optimism that periodically affects them. Such a spot-on satire that it can easily be mistaken for the real thing—countless real life rock bands have described, either affectionately or harrowingly, experiencing their own “Spinal Tap-worthy moments.” The other keys to its success: perfectly modulated comic performances (they’re so funny because the characters they play don’t realize that they’re being funny), clever writing that works in the jokes on several different levels, and the general quality of the music—the lyrics may always be thunderously stupid, but a few of the tunes actually do kinda rock! Eternally rewatchable and quotable (“These go to eleven,” “None more black,” “I think that the problem may have been that there was a Stonehenge monument on the stage that was in danger of being crushed by a dwarf,” “I’m sure I’d feel much worse if I weren’t under such heavy sedation,” and on and on), and also intelligent enough to know when to quit—as proven by the special edition home video release with over an hour of deleted scenes, the filmmakers and editor knew what to keep in and what to leave out, and to end just before the schtick starts becoming repetitive. Proved so popular in the long run that the “fictional” band actually released two albums (Break Like the Wind in 1992 and Back from the Dead in 2009), played live shows, and appeared in a made-for-television sequel (The Return of Spinal Tap). Several familiar faces, from Billy Crystal to Anjelica Huston, make brief appearances.
89/100
24 Hour Party People (2002)
Directed by Michael Winterbottom. Starring Steve Coogan, Lennie James, Paddy Considine, Shirley Henderson, John Thomson, Sean Harris, Rob Brydon, Andy Serkis, Danny Cunningham, Peter Kay. [R]
Exciting, hysterically funny pseudo-historical document of Manchester news reporter Tony Wilson (Coogan), who recognized that the music world was on the verge of a seismic change at the advent of the punk rock era, and went out to found Factory Records and open the nightclub Haçienda, which would go on to become the epicenter of the Madchester rave scene. Writer Frank Cottrell Boyce compiles a lot of material as offbeat, sarcastic references given the solemnity of earth-shaking truth and substance, while director Winterbottom plays around with film stocks, editing tricks, fourth-wall breaks, and contradictory declarations in developing its aggressively in-the-moment aesthetic, as well as a real-life subject too undaunted to be tactful and too courageous to be clever, which makes him the exact person needed to navigate through the volatile but enthralling culture of disorder and excess. Coogan’s style of dry mockery and fatuous self-importance snugly fits inside of Wilson, and the two merge as one long before the film is over. Central music figures shown to be under Wilson’s wing include the members of Joy Division/New Order and Happy Mondays; their music fills the soundtrack, alongside many others, including archival performances from the likes of the Sex Pistols, Iggy Pop, and the Stranglers. Likely to play better to those already familiar with the scene and artists, but all are welcome to play. Features a slew of cameos from both professional actors (Simon Pegg, Christopher Eccleston, etc.) and parties that were involved in the dramatized scene (Wilson himself, Mark E. Smith, etc.).
87/100
Check back in a few days for the next update!
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