The trailers for Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story never impressed me. In fact, I thought it looked stupid, although admittedly much better than pure junk like Meet the Spartans or Superhero/Date/Epic Movie. Even the 74% on Rotten Tomatoes didn’t convince me to go see it when it came out. Then in the past few weeks, I had it recommended to me by quite a few friends. I like my comedy as much as the next guy, but I’m generally very picky and even more unforgiving. Still, I caved in and watched it.
Walk Hard was silly. It was sometimes stupid. Even immature. But I found myself really liking it. Unlike many spoofs and parodies and satires nowadays, it didn’t just reference something and try to make you laugh by saying, “Hey look, this is referencing _______ and that’s why it’s funny.” Most of the jokes were clever, well thought out, and universal enough that the movie will still stand up a decade from now, unlike most of the kind of movies made nowadays where they have a shaved-head Britney Spears getting kicked into a pit. And while maybe it shouldn’t have been, this was a genuinely funny movie – and John C. Reilly was a huge part of that, of course.
Here is a great scene in which the newly famous Dewey walks in on one of his good friends and bandmates (Tim Meadows) smoking marijuana, as he goes about trying to convince Dewey that he doesn’t want to get mixed up with the stuff.
And c’mon, how can’t you laugh during this song?
Thoughts?
I was surprisingly entertained. The “Ray” focused jokes were awesome.
I didn’t love “Walk Hard”, the only thing that made the film bearable were the great musical numbers but I did laugh bloody hard at The Beatles scene. Justin Long as George Harrison was awesome!
I’m picking this up from work tonight. You’ve convinced me to check it out.
i was surprisingly in love with this movie by the end of it. some of the jokes should have gotten old (the brother), but they didn’t. i recommend it.
great lyrics:
“i want you to blow me…… some kisses.”
I just don’t understand people who wouldn’t run out to see a John C. Rielly head lined comedy. Walk Hard has more in common with Anchor Man than Date Movie.
I cant wait for the inevitable Spoof Movie.
Funny that I was all geared up for John C. and Walk Hard until i saw those trailers. It sucked the funny right out of it. I’m seeing from the consensus here that they were highly misleading. Perhaps the marketers wanted to sell the film a la the “Scary/Epic/Date Movie” crowd?
I did very much like the For Your Consideration poster for Walk Hard though…
I got the extended 2 disc dvd. you can only pick the extended version through the extras.
eh. its not better than the theatrical version unfortunately, though it includes some of the scenes i was upset i missed in the theatrical version (Patrick Duffy taking a beating).
But i’m glad i got it, its fun and kind of cult movie-ish, the soundtrack is legitimately great and i listen to it frequently. its not a 5/5 movie by any stretch, but its one i probably would watch more than many of the 5/5 movies in my collection.
Great movie. Got a chance to see it at a screening before it came out in theaters and loved it. Definitely worth it for a DVD purchase.
Hilarious quote from Bill Chambers over at Film Freak Central in his DVD review of Walk Hard:
(emphasis mine)
“Juno-vian” – great word. But comparing this to Juno is absurd.
I don’t think Walk Hard was great. Lots of the jokes were just stupid. But there was a lot to make me laugh hard. Marina’s right about Justin Long as Harrison. “You’ll be making shit songs when I’m 64.” Priceless.
I also loved the different incarnations of Cox. The Dylan era was particularly funny. And even Tim Meadows was pretty good.
All in all, a solid comedy (which is rare for me to say). 3.5/5 stars.
Juno?
are you kidding me? fucking kidding me even?
i cant think of one line in Walk Hard that is trying to be cool or hip at all. if anything, like the quote Andrew mentioned, all my favorite jokes involve overly spelling it out to the audience… the realizations of nabbing a good song title, that whenever a famous person is on screen they call each other by their first name…
Juno? pfft. Walk Hard carries the Talladega Nights/Anchorman flag from beginning to end. Its not as funny to me as either of those other films, but its pretty much the same feel. The soundtrack though, is superior to the film.
I think you guys are missing the tree for the forest. It’s the overly arch and saracstic dialogue that blunts the humour, not that the film in any other way resembles Juno.
Chill Dudes.
Either way, I’m going to do my best to make “Junovian” part of the everyday lexicon.
regardless of how you define it, I cant accept such a critique: without the sarcasm, there is no “Walk Hard” to begin with. The whole concept was a sarcastic response to recent biopic films. If you dont like the movie fine, its not the kind of movie i’d go out of my way to defend, but to suggest ‘the problem with the movie is that its too sarcastic’, sorry, is horseshit. take away the sarcasm and it becomes exactly what its making fun of. Its like saying that Spaceballs should have been more original.
@”Chill Dudes.”
No. The quote was neither funny nor insightful. Don’t even get me started on critics who use terms like “over arch”
I don’t hate Juno, that’s Goon’s bag. But the comparison is just invalid, the two films have very little in common. Their sense of humors are very different.
Kurt, is this another one of those movies you haven’t seen but for some reason have an opinion on? Where were your powers of stubborn curmudgeoness when Andrew was recommending Lars and the Real Girl. There’s a film that deserves be hated and dismissed without seeing.
Rusty, I managed to actually see Lars and TRG before I completely dismissed it!
No, I do enjoy reading Bill Chambers over at film freak, the quote just struck out as amusing for me. I’m actually highly looking forward to WALK HARD, and even Mr. Chambers was not dissing the film, rather praising it, his criticism being (I believe) that the film would have been better if it was more earnest than it actually was…or something like that.
@ “Rusty, I managed to actually see Lars and TRG before I completely dismissed it!”
Right after I posted I remembered you mentioned seeing the film on the show. Faraci nailed it. There is not one second of that film that rings true. And is it even a comedy? I honestly can’t tell. All the actors have a similar expression on their faces that’s something like “I’m sure there’s something funny about this. Could someone explain it too me”.
There was a moment during the emotional, tear jerking montage about the doll dying (spoiler: the sex doll dies) when someone in the audience cautiously experimented with laughing. The experiment was a failure.
Anyways I’m sure Bill Chambers is an upstanding citizen of the film review planet. I’ve never read his work but that one particular quote is sooooooo over arch.
ps. I hate being told to “chill out”
Fair enough Rusty, upon further reflection, when I’m worked up about something, I don’t like it either! Apology on the sang froid suggestion!
I like how Kurt panned Lars for being manipulative yet then complimented Before the Devil Knows Your Dead for its manipulations. All in the same podcast.
Huzzah for Canadian hypocrisy!
Huzzah indeed. There are may elements that go into manipulating the audience. Things aren’t always apples to apples. The structure of BTDKYD molds audience expectations by offering out information, catharsis and plot points in a quite refreshing way for a noir piece.
Lars just wants doll reaction shots. Not all that differently than bad comedy directors use animal reaction shots for laughs. (Note however that Ridley Scott has probably the best animal reaction shot ever in a film, most certainly not a comedy, the cat witnessing Harry Dean Stanton’s demise in Alien). LATRG attempts to sell the audience on a hap-hap-happy community willing to go along with the sugary pop-101ism of ‘let him just work his problems out by pretending nothing is wrong’…Not my cup of tea.
Sad as it is, a gritty movie manipulating the audience probably gets an easier pass than a comedy. I do not know why this is, but I suspect that is the truth. It is our maddening and unquantifiable inconsistencies that make us human, folks!
If you want some amazing animal acting, I can recommend Sunrise and Pierrot Le Fou, both films that are elevated immensely by their animals.
I suppose you could throw in Bresson’s Au hasard Balthazar as one of the more subtle (?) animal flicks. I’ve not seen the film myself though, someday, I’ll dig deep into Bresson…Someday…
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060138/
I guess if you want to classify BTDKYD as a serious modern noir you could, but then why does it so often rely on silly sight gags to provide levity for its bloated melodrama?
Oh I’ll tell you why.
BTDKYD is simply trying to show off how carefully depraved it is, in an effort to garner Oscar glory. It’s neither original, incisive, nor powerful yet it sure throws all its effort into trying to hide behind a flashy narrative device (that it conveniently abandons half-way through the movie) to tell a rather weak and obvious story.
Lars, for all its faults, at least wears its manipulations on its sleeve, free for anyone to judge or bitter Canadians to ridicule. It’d be nice if BTDKYD actually had the guts to treat its audience with that amount of respect.
PS – I hear Kurt hates bubble gum, lollipops and rainbows as well. Something about their sugary sweetness making his soul ache. I just think he needs a hug.
If any of the characters in Lars had been interesting, I would liked it. Obviously it’s overly sentimental, but since it’s not trying to be deep or meaningful, I am just looking for something to keep me interested on a more superficial level, and unfortunately the film is just boring as shit.
Paul Schneider is good, but even him dealing with the same 2bit issue for an hour and a half gets boring eventually.
I haven’t seen BTDKYD though.
The most outstanding animal “acting” I’ve seen are the ants in Phase IV. It’s truly amazing what the filmmaker got them to do.
I can’t wait for Phase IV to finally come out to DVD. Never seen it, heard a lot about it, and very, very much looking forward to it.
…And Matt. I’ve got no problem with rainbows…
Bubblegum and lollipops are only good when used in a saucy way….
if i may challenge:
Kurt, if I remember right you’re a “Dancer in the Dark” fan, yes?
Why is LITRG’s supposed manipulation bad, but DITD, which you must admit is very blatantly manipulative, acceptable?
(It should be noted I like DITD)
is it a matter that the DITD manipulation ends with tragedy, and LITRG is a ‘feel good’ movie? forgiveness for sad pretention, scorn for the uplifting?
back to Mr. Chambers:
“the film would have been better if it was more earnest than it actually was”
Mr. Chambers is crazy. Theres a lot of ways Walk Hard could have been better, but being more earnest is definitely not one of them.
Has anyone actually criticized LATRG for being manipulative? I don’t remember if Kurt did in the podcast. Henrik criticized the movie for it’s terrible characters. Manipulative isn’t even in my critical vocabulary (though sangfroid is, nice!). I think in general film buffs necessarily don’t object to manipulation, it’s hard wired into the medium. It would be hard to imagine a more outspoken proponent of manipulation than Hitchcock yet Spielberg might just qualify.
The Dancer In The Dark (one of my less favorite LVT flicks) analogy is a stretch. It’s like comparing apples to some fruit no one’s ever heard of. Speaking of which, Au hasard Balthazar is just a watered down remake of Dogville. Bresson didn’t like human reaction shots, so your definitely not getting any donkey reaction shots out of him. The difference between the two films is that Dogville’s Jesus parallels actually have something to say Christianity and the Bible.
btw MGamble, I don’t get the hate for BTDKYD. It’s a thriller that drags the viewer into the depths of emotional hell. I honestly don’t even remember a moment of levity in the film. “Sight gags”? Was there a scene where Philip Seymour Hoffman throws a pie at someone?
@Goon – “Why is LITRG’s supposed manipulation bad, but DITD, which you must admit is very blatantly manipulative, acceptable?”
Because Dancer in the Dark is like a cinematic throwdown along the lines of Funny Games. It’s a filmmaker vs. the audience sort of things, were many moments of emotional truth creep in around the artifice.
@Rusty, I’m guilty for acusing Lars for being manipulative, that in itself is not a criticism, I think it is merely the execution-style of the manipulation that I didn’t really like. Taste. Lars is just too bloody facile. Going for the easy way out in my opinion. It’s great for grandmas and tea parties though, a good double bill with On Golden Pond…
I think in general film buffs necessarily don’t object to manipulation, it’s hard wired into the medium. -TOTALLY AGREE RUSTY! Well said.
Oh, and by the way, I’m loving how this thread has truly derailed! Seriously, this is what Row Three is about…let the conversation FLOW….
Kudos. Just wanted to say that.
@ “Oh, and by the way, I’m loving how this thread has truly derailed! Seriously, this is what Row Three is about…let the conversation FLOW….”
now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to go over to TMB and bring up Robert Bresson in their GI Joe talkback.
You silly man. Low, but funny.
I constantly miss out on the TMB hardcore fun! You should put a post up at rowthree whenever you get in a row with TMB.
I think when you start noticing the manipulation it becomes a weakness (unless in extreme cases like Funny Games of course). The point of most films is to tell some sort of story (or situation as the case may often be), and the way they tell it is up to the filmmakers. Sometimes you feel they are desperate, grasping at straws to get their point across (think Bumblebee getting captured in Transformers, Schindler’s monologue about the ring in Schindler’s List or the crying scene after Gandalf goes down with the firebeast in Lord of the rings), and that annoys any thinking human being. Nobody likes having things spelled out when they’re ready to move on, and nobody appreciates not being allowed to make up your own mind. Lars and the Real Girl at times taps into this desperation territory, both in the color scheme, the acting style, the music etc. The fact that it is not trying to be meaningful saves it from being completely insulting, as it is, it’s merely boring.
I’m not really one to take a film as an insult (unless the film in question is Ghost World, in which case I take the film as it was meant; a personal affront to me as well as to decency and humanity.)
Lars doesn’t insult me; it rings false for every single minute of its run time. The main character is a self involved, rude, uncharismatic dolt and an ingrate who demands that his entire community stop their lives to entertain his delussions. The characters reward and indulge him at ever turn. Dinner invites, fawning co-eds and ambulance rides for a sex toy. Nothing’s too good for Lars.
The towns people show up to a funeral for a doll and cry. In no sense do any of these people help cure his delussion. Exactly the opposite. They enable his dysfunctional behavior.
And in what sense is this a “feel good” ending? Why does Lars deserve a girl like Kelly Garner. What did he do to win her affections?
More importantly what did Kelly Garner do to deserve being stuck with the village idiot? She’d clearly have been better off with that other guy for reason’s that I think would be obvious. 1) unlike Lars he actually likes her. 2) He’s actually a functioning adult who is not getting married to the furniture. Instead the film dispatches him for being “uninteresting”, a red handed inditement of the film’s phoney-balony “compassion” for its characters.
And isn’t he still severely mentally ill, or now that he and the office hotty are hooking up has that petty device of mental illness been abandoned?
I found Garner’s character annoying (in a realistic way that was right for her character) but she’s still attractive and personable, even I fell for her a little bit after her little bowling victory wiggle . Even in a small town (was it Alaska?) she’d have better prospects than Lars. Anyone would have better prospects than Lars. I feel bad for Lars’ house plants.
And am I the only one who a has a problem with Mr. Sensitive and Slutty McSkankerton hooking up LITERALLY over his dead fiance’s grave? Weren’t they all inside crying over her tragic death one minute ago? The doll rode in an ambulance, stayed at the hospital and was buried in a cemetary. It’s a little late to decide you never really cared for it.
There’s what’s so objectionable about this particular brand of manipulation. We’re being manipulated towards emotions that are completely phoney and wrong; emotions that are completely uninformed by actual human experience. Mr. Spock could’ve written a better romantic comedy.
I would’ve considered it a feel good movie if at the end they banished Lars to the woods with his sex doll and never spoke of him again. It would’ve been a more honest ending as well. Lars clearly hates other people, why isn’t that a legitimate life style choice? Why does he have to couple up? Why does the film need to cram these characters into this awkward ending that’s so obviously wrong for them?
When I asked above if this was supposed to be a comedy that was a legitimate question. Seriously, Gamble, Goon, Jonathon, Andrew I’m actually curious to hear if you guys found this film (specifically the last act) to be funny or heart breaking. I know films can be both but during the tear jerking hospital montage are you guys scoffing at the towns people for crying about a doll or are you sympathetic towards them? Is it a tear jerker or is it a parody of a tear jerker?
ps. I’m not actually going to inject Bresson into the TMB GI Joe talk back. I just thought it was a funny idea that illustrated how misguided it is to bother over there. A point I think we’re all collectively coming around to.
Rusty – Oh I don’t hate BTDKYD by any means, I’m merely exagerating my disappointment with it because Kurt was severly showing his bias in that particular podcast and he doesn’t afford me many opportunities to needle him.
And their was one rather blatant sight gag in the film that pissed me off to no end. It occurred while PSH and Marissa Tomei were fighting in their apartment and she had her bags packed to leave. It was a tense and emotional scene punctuated by the craptastic gag of her struggling to drag her bags out of the apartment. It was a blatant attempt to lessen the emotional power of the scene, and IMO, is piss poor storytelling/directing/filmmaking. It conveys a complete lack of trust in your audience to deal with with an emotional powerful scene and sullies the entire moment. If BTDKYD was truly seeking to draw the audience into emotional hell such a cheap joke would have never entered into the film.
As a side note, I’m not sure how anyone can deem the film a thriller. It’s pretty much straight melodrama, and it isn’t too far off from being a modern stylization of King Lear.
Lars is just too bloody facile. Going for the easy way out in my opinion.
So if they had replaced the sex doll with say…homemade movies you’d be fine with a film that preaches about the joy of community?
I love Goon’s (unintentionally I’m assuming) changing of the acronym title of the movie from LATRG to LITRG. That completely changes the tone (not to mention the MPAA’s rating) of the movie. lol.
@ “As a side note, I’m not sure how anyone can deem the film a thriller. It’s pretty much straight melodrama”
yeah, that’s fair. I just said thriller cause there’s guns and stuff.
There ain’t a lot of love around here for Be Kind Rewind, a very, very flawed movie that doesn’t even come close to earning its supposed emotional pay-off. But BK,R exists in a much more artificial (on the surface) world that LATRG. Not sure where I was going with this, but there you have it.
Since it’s already been brought up, I’ll divert the conversation and point you over to Cahiers du Cenima where they’re tracked down a few sweded films they liked. I particularly love the first one.
I was speaking about Son of Rambow Kurt. Or did that movie piss in your corn flakes too?
I didn’t 100% love SON OF RAMBOW, but I liked it a helluva lot. It’s sweet and has great lead performances, and is made with a little more care than Be Kind, Rewind.