THE ROCKER

FOX

RELEASED 17 October 2008

Like some poor 'School of Rock'  relation ambling along five years later comes 'The Rocker'. It's films like this one which make me wonder how so many people working on a film can produce such a total waste of time. Let's get a brief synopsis out of the way quick. Fish (Rainn Wilson) is kicked out of Heavy Metal band 'Vesuvius' after they're promised a record contract. Twenty years later and the band are still popular, while Fish works in a metal (get it) suppliers in a boring desk-bound capacity. When his kid nephew's band loses their drummer just before the prom they are going to play at, Fish steps in to help out. Before you know it, the band (A.D.D.) are off on tour.

So the biggest complaint I have with 'The Rocker' is that I didn't laugh once. So as a comedy, it failed completely. I'm unaware of Rainn Wilson apart from briefly seeing him in the US version of 'The Office', but he's simply not funny here. And not only is he not funny, he actually seems to be doing an acting impression of an unfunny Jack Black performance. So he can't even successfully pretend to be someone who has occasionally been funny. As for the rest of the cast - totally bland.

Secondly, it's a rock movie, so does it 'rock'? No, it most certainly doesn't, unless you call 'The Jonas Brothers' a rock band. The lyrics are terrible, the music sounds like stock music you'd find on a website, and the band have absolutely no 'look' going on. They actually look like they were dressed by a mail-order catalogue. They look so boring.

Finally, 'The Rocker' is filmed like a cheap sitcom. Everything is bright and colourful and fake-looking. Shouldn't a rock movie look a bit grungey, a bit greasy, a bit dirty around the edges? I know it's aimed at kids, but the gig that opens the film doesn't look like any rock venue I've ever been to. Brit director Peter Cattaneo was also responsible for 'The Full Monty', and it's almost impossible to understand how he could turn out that gritty and famous success when 'The Rocker' looks like it's directed by a robot. The camera moves around the band at a snail's pace, totally destroying any sense of excitement or musical urgency. I can't remember a film looking so lifeless for a long time.

It isn't often that I see a movie that has nothing I can recommend it for, but 'The Rocker' is one such case. 'The Shocker', more like it.

ONE OUT OF FIVE