[IMDB link]
RATINGS:
Claire: Netflix: 2.8/5 stars. IMDB: 5.8/10.
Carolyn: Netflix: 4.6/5 stars. IMDB: 8/10.
The native public rating for this movie is: Netflix: 3.3/5 stars, IMDB: 6.2/10.
CLAIRE’S THOUGHTS:
I totally knew this was going to happen, but watched it anyway…
This had the same failings that most of these “music performance comedy” movies have. What is that? A focus on the competition to the exclusion of humor.
If I had to have music mixed with my comedy, I’d much rather watch something like: Walk Hard:The Dewey Cox Story…. Or Adventures Of Power.
This is more like Rock Of Ages or Pitch Perfect. I just didn’t give a fuck about what was happening and who it was happening to. These movies are where Carolyn & I disagree the most of any movies ever. I’m usually sub-3.0-Netflix stars and she’s usually 4.2+ on these.
But for me? It just became too procedural. Watch a band rise to fame, with a few jokes. Yea well — I could be watching a documentary about bands I actually listen too — and they’d make me laugh just as much. Except it’d be real.
One-dimensional characters. Emma Stone is a 10 and as smoldering as ever, but her whole character is “She doesn’t smile until she does”. There. I just spoiled the whole movie for you. She doesn’t smile until she does. He doesn’t get chicks until he does. He doesn’t grow up and stop being an idiot until he does. He doesn’t stop moping until he does. I’ll leave it as an exercise to the unfortunate viewer to match these summaries to the appropriate character.
This movie has a great cast; mediocre, formulaic writing; and bad music. And deus ex machina, of course. It tries to be poetic, but mostly it’s a bunch of musical hand-waiving to get you distracted from the fact that it’s more of a musical procedural than a comedy.
CAROLYN’S THOUGHTS:
I enjoyed it. I thought it was funny and enjoyable, and I liked the characters… but Claire is right about the characters just being “they don’t blank until they do.” It did have that as a pitfall, I guess. The music wasn’t great, but I thought it was way better than Pitch Perfect. I feel like I liked Rock Of Ages better, though. I apparently rated Rock Of Ages 4.6/8.6, so it was only slightly better. :)
PEOPLE:
Directed by Peter Cattaneo (The Full Monty).
Written by Maya Forbes (17 eps of The Larry Sanders Show), Wallace Wolodarsky (10 eps of The Simpsons, 3 eps of The Tracy Ullman Show), and Ryan Jaffe.
Rainn Wilson (Dwight Schrute in The Office, Six Feet Under, Super, Juno, Transformers 2, My Super Ex-Girlfriend, 5 eps of Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!, 1 ep of Adventure Time) as Fish.
Christina Applegate as Kim, Curtis’s mom.
Teddy Geiger as Curtis, emo bandmate.
Josh Gad (Mondo in Good Vibes, The Internship, Frozen) as Matt, the nephew bandmate.
Emma Stone (The Amazing Spider-Man movies, Superbad, The Croods, Movie 43, Zombieland, Crazy Stupid Love, The House Bunny, 2 eps of Robot Chicken, 1 ep of Malcolm In The Middle) as Amelia, the chick bandmate.
Jeff Garlin (Curb Your Enthusiasm, Arrested Development, In A World, Fun With Dick And Jane, Safety Not Guaranteed, Toy Story Movies, Wall-E, Run Ronnie Run, MADtv, 14 eps of Mad About You) as Stan, Fish’s brother-in-law.
Jane Lynch (A.C.O.D., Wreck-It Ralph, The Three Stooges, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Glee, Shrek Forever After, Afternoon Delight, 15 eps of The L Word, 3 eps of Neighbors From Hell, 2 eps of Arrested Development, 2 eps of Father Of The Pride, 2 eps of The Cleveland Show, 1 ep of The Spectacular Spider-Man, 1 ep of The Simpsons, 1 ep of News Radio) as Lisa, Fish’s sister.
Jason Sudeikis (The Cleveland Show, Drinking Buddies, The Ten, Movie 43, What Happens In Vegas, Saturday Night Live, 2 eps of Portlandia) as David Marshall, the band manager. He’s from Fairfax, VA
Will Arnett (Gob Bluth in Arrested Development, Sit Down Shut Up, BoJack Horseman in BoJack Horseman, The Brothers Solomon, Horton Hears A Who, Ratatouille, Men In Black 3, The Increasingly Poor Decisions Of Todd Margaret, Despicable Me, Wristcutters: A Love Story, The Secret World Of Arrietty, 2 eps of The Sopranos, 1 ep of The Simpsons, 1 ep of Delocated, 1 ep of The Office) as Lex, former bandmate.
Howard Hesseman (WKRP in Cincinnati, Head Of The Class, Halloween 2, Gridlock’d, Police Academy 2, 7 eps of Soap) as Gator, the bus driver.
Fred Armisen (Portlandia, Terry in Out There, Eurotrip, Anchorman, The Smurfs movies, Saturday Night Live, he’s also a small part in The Dictator, 5 eps of Archer) as Kerr, former bandmate.
Bradley Cooper (The Hangover movies, Limitless, The A-Team, All About Steve, American Hustle, Guardians Of The Galaxy, He’s Just Not That Into You, Wet Hot American Summer, Stella Shorts, Wedding Crashers, 6 eps of Nip/Tuck) as Trash, the former band manager.
Jon Glaser (Delocated, Lucy: The Daughter Of The Devil, Stroker in Stroker & Hoop, The Dictator) as Billy. Didn’t see who that was :/
Aziz Ansari as Aziz. (more…)