THE ROCKER

The Rocker is a mediocre film aimed at teenagers, the people who like Will Farrell and John C. Rilley comedies, who weren€™t around for the 80€™s but still like to make fun of them, and who still haven€™t realized that bands like Dashboard Confessional and Sum 41 actually suck. In spite of a completely uninspired cookie-cutter script written by focus-group marketers, actors Rainn Wilson and Josh Gad manage to provide a few genuine laughs that don€™t begin to approach making up for an otherwise dull movie. Main plot thrust revolves around Robert Fishman (Wilson), who was a drummer with a struggling glam-rock/hair-metal band in the 1980€™s who was sold out by his bandmates in order for them to sign a major record label contract. Twenty years later, he lives a regretful, unsuccessful life at a corporate office. Through circumstance, he moves into the attic of his brother and comes into contact with his nephew, a nerdy teen outsider who just happens to be starting a band and just happens to be looking for a drummer. You can probably write the rest of the script yourself. The movie has the predictability and writing quality of a primetime teen comedy series but the 14-year-olds the movie is aimed at probably won€™t notice. Rainn Wilson does his best to imitate Ferrell and Riley, sometimes to genuinely comedic effect€”there€™s a lot of self-deprecating displaying of his fat, pasty body and lots of scenes where he yells things enthusiastically and then falls down or gets hit in the head. I€™d like to see him outside such a paint-by-numbers movie where he could actually create a real role instead of mimicking someone else€™s; one gets the impression there€™s a lot more talent in him than this movie suggests, which can be seen in his Emmy-nominated role on The Office. Equally suggestive is young Josh Gad, who gives an honest and funny interpretation of the nerdy-yet-somewhat-cool fat highschooler. Christina Applegate is also in it as his mom, looking a lot older than most of us remember and managing to pick up some of the slack dropped by the other young leads, who do a lot of posing and one-note acting, unfortunately for them. There€™s really not much I can say about this. I laughed a few times, but they were sort of forced. I wouldn€™t expect much from this film, it€™s a clichéd and tired concept, but it could have been a lot better if it wasn€™t written by someone reading the manual for how-to-appeal-to-teens; this film has the corporate construction of pap like American Idol and The Backstreet Boys. It roped in semi-talented up-and-comers who want a shot at breaking out but really sabotages their career by making them imitate the second-rate trash that€™s already out there. I hope one day everyone involved in this film gets a second chance to show they have talent, when marketing executives aren€™t directing a picture, because you sure wouldn€™t know it from this film.

rating:1.5