Director: Adam Shankman
Starring: Julianne Hough & Diego Boneta (and Tom Cruise)
Grade: C-
As a big fan of guilty pleasure movies I had high hopes Rock
of Ages would fall squarely into the so-bad-it’s-good category. Sadly, the
movie is not so-bad-it’s-good, so much as so-bad-it’s-boring; a shiny, sleek,
dull tale of 1980s hair metal that gets so bogged down by lifeless performances
that not even the best Journey songs can save it.
Admittedly, I’m not exactly the right demographic for this film,
a jukebox musical set in 1987 with a score made entirely of ’80s power ballads.
Like The Wedding Singer, The Carrie Diaries, and the upcoming ABC sitcom The Goldbergs,
Rock of Ages relies heavily on ’80s nostalgia to make its audience feel warm
and fuzzy. Which means we get jokes about men with long hair, references to
Michael Jackson getting pale, and riffs on Dirty Dancing. As a child of the
’90s, I recognize the songs, but don’t have memories of belting them out in my
wild and crazy youth (if there were a musical made up of Spice Girls, Hanson,
and Britney Spears songs I would be all over it). For better or for worse, I
can't watch this movie with nostalgia-colored glasses. At its best, the film
uses one song to unite characters in different locations with different
problems all belting out the same lyrics. At its worst, people just stand
around and sing songs you kind of like.
Probably indicative of how much thought went into these
characters, the film’s DVD cover prominently displays the most famous cast
members with superlatives like “The Puritan,” “The Diva,” “The Dreamer” and
“The Legend.” The characters are one-dimensional archetypes you've seen in
countless movies before. Alec Baldwin and his friend Russell Brand own a famous
but financially struggling club called The Bourbon Room on LA's Sunset Strip.
It’s where aspiring musician with a heart of gold Drew (Diego Boneta) works as
a barback It's also where he helps our heroine Sherrie (Julianne Hough) get a
job as a waitress as soon as she steps off the bus from Oklahoma (after getting
her suitcase full of records stolen, LA is the worst!) Catherine Zeta-Jones is
a moralizing Christian (wed to philandering mayor Bryan Cranston) determined to
rid Los Angeles of moral corruption. Tom Cruise is as a legendary rockstar
named Stacee Jaxx who is leaving his band for a solo career with the help of
his greedy manger Paul Giamatti. Malin Akerman is a mousy Rolling Stone's reporter
who falls for Stacee. And Mary J. Blige is a strip club owner with a hardened
but charitable heart.
Following in the footsteps of pioneering movies like Coyote
Ugly and Burlesque, Sherrie is a small town girl with big city dreams who wants
to be a famous singer but ends up working at a strip club. Meanwhile Catherine
Zeta-Jones crusades to shut down The Bourbon Room, Stacee tries to figure out
who he is as a solo artist, Drew falls in love with and then dumps Sherrie (he
thinks she cheated on him with Stacee) before selling out for his own musical
career (he joins a preppy boy band). Elsewhere Alec Baldwin struggles to keep
The Bourbon Room afloat and Russell Brand proves he can land a joke no matter
how weak the material.
Like Hairspray, director Adam Shankman’s previous attempt at
a movie musical, Rock of Ages can’t quite seem to find a way to blend the songs
and book scenes. My current theory is this has something to do with the lack of
applause. In live theatre applause is a natural button to a song and a
transition from the fantastical production numbers to the more grounded book
scenes. On screen, high energy songs just end and people start talking again.
I've yet to see a modern day movie musical that makes the transition work
seamlessly. It doesn’t help that while Rock of Ages' dialogue may have played
well in a big Broadway stage, it feels hokey when it takes place on a real
street. (Upon seeing The Bourbon Room Sherrie exclaims, “I have like 10 record
that were recorded there.” “Don’t you mean had?” Drew quips.)
The movie is based on a highly successful 2009 Broadway musical which
quickly became a critical hit and fan favorite (it’s still running today). In
contrast, the movie adaptation tanked both critically and at the box office.
How can you explain that disparity? I think a lot of it comes down to tone.
Diego Boneta and Julianne Hough are just too earnest in
their roles as star-crossed lovers. (Which is unsurprising given that Boneta’s
previous roles include a telenovela and a stint on 90210, and Hough was a
dancer on Dancing With the Stars before finding greater success as Ryan
Seacrest’s beard.) The film is bogged down by their by-the-numbers romance and
perpetual duets. Weirdly, it also seems no one told Tom Cruise he was in a
comedy (even though Stacee has a Scotch-carrying monkey named Hey Man). Cruise
plays everything like he’s in an indie drama about an aging rocker (and he’s not
bad in that film, it’s just not this film). His voice (or his autotune) is
pleasant, but he can’t find the humor behind Stacee Jaxx’s stoic, serious
performer. Instead he just comes across like a stoic, serious performer.
Although I never saw it myself, I suspect what made Rock of
Ages so successful on Broadway was its fun, self-referential attitude. The
characters may take themselves seriously, but the actors are in on the joke,
allowing the audience to see the humor in all that commitment to rocking out.
It’s a tricky tone to pull off on film (something like Baz Lurhmann’s Strictly
Ballroom does it remarkably well, and Glee is occasionally successful at it as
well). Russell Brand, doing his Russell Brand thing, Catherine Zeta-Jones as
the vampy villain, and Malin Akerman as the dowdy reporter who experiences a
sexual awakening come closest to finding the right balance, but sadly the
film’s three leads are not up to the task. What could have been ridiculously
stupid-fun ends up feeling dull and plodding. There's no denying the music is
infectious, and that alone saves the movie from becoming a total drag to sit
through. In trying to parody an era, Rock of Ages captures the glam and glitz
but forgot to be funny along the way.
Reality factor: I know that we’re not supposed to be too
concerned with character motivations, but Sherrie’s desire to be a singer is
weirdly dropped for most of the film. At one point Mary J. Blige informs her,
“It’s not fame and fortune you’ve been looking for, it’s love.” Umm, I’m pretty
sure she came looking for a career, but okay. [0 out of 5]
Eye-candy factor: Yes he makes us all uncomfortable,
but Tom Cruise does have a great body. Now let’s never speak of this again. [3
out of 5]
Aww factor: Baldwin and Brand’s third act love confession
set to “I Can’t Fight This Feeling Anymore” is both funnier and sweeter than
anything Hough and Botega do for the rest of the film. It’s a glimpse of what Rock
of Ages could have been with the right cast of actors, rather than a random collection
of pretty faces.
[5 out of 5 for them; 1 out of 5 for the movie as a whole]
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