 |  | Get Showtimes... |
Review #406 of 365
Movie Review of Music and Lyrics (2006) [PG-13] 96 minutes
WIP™ Scale: (1st viewing $12.50 + 2nd viewing $12.50) / 2 = $12.50
Where Viewed: Colorado Cinemas Cherry Creek 8, Denver, CO
When 2nd Seen: 22 February 2007
Time: 7:10 p.m.
Film's Official Website • Film's Trailer
DVD Release Date: unscheduled
Review Dedicated to: AET
Directed by: Marc Lawrence (Two Weeks Notice)
Written by: Marc Lawrence (Miss Congeniality)
Featured Cast (Where You Might Remember Him/Her From):
Hugh Grant (American Dreamz) • Scott Porter ("Friday Night Lights") • Brad Garrett ("Everybody Loves Raymond") • Drew Barrymore (Fever Pitch) • Haley Bennett (debut) • Kristen Johnston (Strangers with Candy) • Campbell Scott (The Exorcism of Emily Rose)
Soundtrack: Download now from 
-or- order the CD below
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word or less review of this film]
Note: This is a spoiler review. If you do not wish to read the spoiler, please click here for the non-spoiler review.
Once again, for the record, Music and Lyrics is NOT a film for current teens, nor is it a so-called 'chick flick'; and, perhaps most incredibly, people who've developed a foul taste in their mouth for the film's two stars Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore are likely to see they are nearly perfectly cast and utterly credible in this film. A second viewing of the film only emphasizes these points more clearly. It's already been admitted by this critic that he was a teeny-bopper in the 80s, and that, actually, yes, while semi-cool again, at least for a few more years, retro cool again, 80s music was not considered cool by anyone but teeny boppers of the 80s. In fact, it was pretty much universally loathed by everyone else as being techno repetitive ear candy sung by ridiculous bands with marginal talent. Kids of the 90s, in fact, found the music disgusting and longed for the music of the 60s. My how the times change. So, really, this is a film for those teeny boppers now into our "the new 30s" as in our 30s early 40s. See this film to take a walk down memory lane in a fun, sometimes syrupy but nonetheless 'pop', way. From the opening mock 80s music video for the band 'PoP' which features a reverse-age make-uped Hugh Grant along side the current "Friday Night Lights" star Scott Porter both with the Duran Duran hair-styles (blonde and brown respectively) where they perform their hit song, "Pop Goes My Heart" with we are taking ourselves way-too-seriously, over-choreographed, gyrating dance moves and hand gestures style, the film gets off with a zip. If you leave the theatre with this song still in your mind, don't be surprised as this was the devilish power of most 80s pop songs. The film then juts right into some mockery and jabs directed toward the 2K0s penchant for reality series gone wrong, in this case Battle of the 80s Music Has Beens. A flashy network commercial asks viewers if they remember the name of the other guy in PoP as everyone knows Sir Colin Thompson (Scott Porter) who has gone on after his solo career to become an internationally popular actor, singer, and superstar with his own cologne called "Whiff of Colin". Surprisingly, Alex Fletcher (Hugh Grant) and PoP's other lead singer, is perfectly happy with his 'has been' label. He remarks how the status indicates he's already done his greatest work in the past greatly reducing the pressure to ever do anything good again in the future. Not meant to imply that he's given up on life, not at all. He's simply comfortable with who he is, fine with playing a few gigs at Knott's Berry Farm and 20-year class reunions where women in their 40s still go ga-ga over his dance moves to the chagrin of their "sorry they didn't age so well", balding, out-of-shape husbands. This is a refreshing take on life for the former star. Things for Alex are rather mundane until the current, international superstar, teen idol of all time and additional jab at the 2k0ers who seem to commingle brilliant ancient multi-cultural traditions with current overtly provocative notions in the form of, Cora Corman (Haley Bennett) 'pops' into his life. Turns out that one of his pop songs really got her through her parents divorce when she was 7. So, she wants to meet him and offer him the opportunity to revitalize his career, if it is meant to be, by writing a song for her new CD which must be called "Way Back into Love" as this was the title of a book she just read that helped her survive her bitter break up with her boyfriend of two entire months and performing it live at Madison Square Garden in a week. How's the 'has been' supposed to write a in a few days without his former bandmate when he's written nothing in over a decade? Fortunately, his manager, Chris (Brad Garrett) has a plan! A lyricist will be hired to help him. A few bars later, however, Sophie Fisher (Drew Barrymore) saves the day when she drops by to care, and badly, for Alex's plants and inadvertently completes the rhyming couplets of some of the musical phrases upon which they are working. This alienates the professional lyricist, but sets in motion the events that will lead to Alex and Sophie's eventual 'hook up'. With droll humor and a genuine appreciation for the era and the lives we children of the 80s can relate, writer / director Marc Lawrence has captured splendidly in these two performances by Mr. Grant and Ms Barrymore exactly the dynamic most of us are feeling right now. We are still in love with whom we were and don't believe we cannot still have those days. Playing the 8 or so years younger sister of the real 'PoP' fan, her sister, Ms Barrymore, comes across exactly the same way my younger sister comes across. She doesn’t really get the 80s music thing, but she still loves me anyway. So, when Sophie realizes who Alex is and he invites her to write with him, her own baggage of a recent bitter break-up comes out. Her life has been in a state of virtual paralysis ever since her mentor English professor used her as the source for his new best seller which portrays the life of a young woman who beds down her famous English Professor to get her book fast-tracked to publishers. This has soured her on writing and much of her life, until Alex finally persuades her to write what turns out to be just the song that Cora was looking for. From the moment the song is a go, though, Sophie has misgivings about Cora and her intentions. Cora represents a lot of the new age over-sexualization of children to which she is adamantly opposed. Cora dances in skimpy and revealing outfits to music with evocative themes. She worries that Coral will destroy their song and change its meaning which she has come to love. She constantly risks putting the "soon on the path back to stardom" Alex back on the bar-mitzvah rotation. So, he works to keep her at bay and even tries to sabotage her at times from getting her point across. Worse, he learns of her Achilles heel, and he uses it against her—sort of. Really, he tries to get her to see that she's been living the life of her literary nemesis by not getting on with her life. He says some things that hurt her deeply. She's all but given up on him, despite a one-nigh-hook up until her sister forces her to attend the Cora Corman concert with her niece and nephew who've told all their schoolmates that their Aunt wrote Cora's new song. The finale of the film involves an opening Cora number followed by what they all believe will be the new duet. Cora announces the next song will be by Alex Fletcher sending Sophie and her family into the doldrums because they think Alex and Cora are robbing Sophie of her much-deserved writing credit. Turns out, though that Alex sings a beautiful song he has written himself, just to apologize to Sophie in front of 60,000 people. After that, and a perfect make-up scene, Alex and Cora perform the new rendition of "Way Back into Love" without the Cora touches that turned Sophie off. Turns out that Cora cannot resist a good love story herself, and Alex says it's the only way he can get Sophie back. The duo is actually quite a wonderful performance reminiscent of the great ballads of the 80s. All evidence supports that Hugh Grant, Haley Bennet and Drew Barrymore actually do their own singing for all of the songs in the film—check the artists given in the credits and on iTunes™. This little detail, in my mind anyway, seals the deal for why I really loved this film. I don't care if people too old or too young didn't get it. The great humor and droll sensibility was perfect. I loved the music. I thought Hugh Grant did a remarkable job in his performance. Seeing it a second time shows the physical nature of the role and the 'English' he adds to the nuances. He actually looks the role in every way. Drew Barrymore's penchant for pouty pays off at last. Here she can capitalize on it as it is the way of her character. Haley Bennet is a surprise find and treat in the film as she dons the queen teen diva cloak to perfection. This smart, funny, sweet, sharp, retro look at life for those 80s teeny boppers who face living life in foreign times can find refuge, solace, comfort, and laughter in a film that rightly points out our own insecurities and how to move on from them. I thoroughly enjoyed this film, and I believe anyone in the age range of 36-43 will also. Others, you may not. You may not get it. But, rest assured, if you are younger, you'll get it eventually, and if you are older, too bad you don't have a film like this that can do what Music and Lyrics did for me. Anything to help us reclaim a bit of our youth and imagination after decades of forced servitude to the morals and values of our parents as we grew up and though we were supposed to be consumptive, ladder-climbing, war-mongering idiots, is a good thing in my book.
Back to Top | W.I.P. Scale™ | Most Recently Reviewed Films | Films of 2005 | Films of 2006 | Films of 2007
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word review of this film]
Click for 'Review Lite' [a 150-word review of this film]
Other Projects Featuring Music and Lyrics (2007)
Cast Members
Hugh Grant
• Scott Porter • Brad GarrettDrew Barrymore
• Haley Bennett • Kristen JohnstonCampbell Scott
Writer / Director
Marc Lawrence
| CD Soundtrack | DVD | VHS |
| Related CD | Related Game | Related CDs |
Music and Lyrics (2007) Review-lite [150-word cap]
Contrary to the blogsphere, Music and Lyrics isn't a chick-flick for teens, rather it's for the teenagers of the 1980s who are now soundly into their 40s. At once both a retrospective and an introspection, it stars Hugh Grant as the former 80s pop star, Alex Fletcher and Drew Barrymore as his mercurial 15-year younger, unexpected co-lyricist, Sophie Fisher. An opportunity to write and perform a new pop ballad with teen queen of the day, Cora (Haley Bennett), turns the fortunes of both around. Writer / Director Marc Lawrence delivers, for those of us 40-somethings who lived the past 25 years in utter denial of what was going on and feeling powerless to do anything but hide behind the jobs we took to placate our parents and the lives we lived to satisfy the marketers, a film that is a self-help book wrapped up in catchy pop music and lyrics
No comments:
Post a Comment