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Rock Star
**1/2
Cinema Releases - January 26, 2002
Rated on a 4-star scale. Certificate 15. 105
minutes. Directed by Stephen Herek. Written by John Stockwell. Starring Mark
Wahlberg, Jennifer Anniston, Jason Flemyng, Timothy Spall, Dominic West,
Jason Bonham, Jeff Pilson, Zakk Wylde, Dagmara
Dominczyk.
This really happened. In 1996, British heavy metal
gods Judas Priest fired lead singer Rob Halford and replaced him with Ripper
Owens, a kid from Ohio who sang for a tribute band.
"Rock Star" features Mark Wahlberg
as Chris Cole, a kid from New Jersey obsessively dedicated to being the frontman
for a group that covers a fictional band called Steel Dragon. "It's a
tribute band, not a covers band!" he declares incessantly, on top
of pedantic attention to detail that includes making sure the lead guitarist
is making his instrument wail properly. "It should be more of a sexual
cry!"
Wahlberg's mania starts to bug his fellow band
members, and he gets fired, but the very next day a guy from Steel Dragon
phones up and asks him to audition as a replacement for their original singer,
who wants to come out of the closet, settle down, and teach ballet dancing,
or something. As this movie is set not only in the world of heavy metal,
but in the 1980s, we see a lot of big haircuts and hear a lot of American
actors putting on phoney British accents -- and this is the world the Wahlberg
character loves. He gets the job, goes on tour with his favourite band, gets
to live his dream.
Along for the ride is his girlfriend and manager,
played by Jennifer Anniston; she quickly sees the slippery slope presented
by this world of sex, drugs and general excess, and moves to Seattle to start
a business. Wahlberg sticks around, living the high life, naively unsuspecting
of the dangers of substance abuse, celebrity and group
politics.
The trajectory of "Rock Star" is predictable --
we know that there'll be fun for a while, then things will turn stale, and
then there'll be a sort of bittersweet, dispirited finish to it all. Good
things must come to an end, and the endings of most rock careers are pretty
much the same. "Rock Star" is nicely made on a technical level, but it happens
as expected, ends abruptly and doesn't think to offer us any surprises. "Boogie
Nights", the movie in which Wahlberg played a rising and falling porn star,
was a masterpiece with sharply drawn characters and satirical edge. "Rock
Star" has neither -- its characters are pleasant and its jokes are understated,
making the movie passable but unsubstantial. More could have been done with
the premise.
This is not a good movie, but I guess it is a
nice one. Wahlberg is sincere and likeable, and of the supporting cast, Anniston
stands out -- her character has the most interesting attitude in the picture,
intrigued but not blinded by the insane aura of celebrity life and eager
to counter idiotic ramblings with sarcastic comebacks based on common sense.
"Rock Star" also has some great background; a porn cinema in Wahlberg's home
town plays a movie called "Das Bootie", and the Steel Dragon drummer is at
one point heard to say, "My fiancée's really busy at the moment...
something about a yearbook committee."
COPYRIGHT©
2002 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
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