Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story (2007)

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Usually when box office trends reach absurd redundancy the beat-it-'till-its-dead writers of the Scary Movie, Epic Movie, Date Movie, etc. series come calling and mock Hollywood with little intelligence or humor. Who better, then, is there to call than Judd Apatow to send-up the musical biopic trend of Ray, Walk the Line, Dreamgirls, and others and to do it right. Walk Hard, the life story of Dewey Cox, played by John C. Reilly, pokes fun at countless Hollywood cliches and music icons, and does so not by shooting direct imitations of the films, but creating a refreshingly original character in the mold of the biopic. Reilly is brilliant as Cox, the musical prodigy who strives throughout his life to find love, stay high, please his father, all while walking hard. Reilly proves he is more than a Will Farrell side-man and can carry a comedy on his shoulders, and carry it hard. The casting director was brilliant in pairing two of the best female comedy actors available around Reilly to play the mother of his children and his "June Carter." Kristen Wiig (SNL) and Jenna Fischer (The Office) provide plenty of laughs and surprising depth in bizarre scenes without resorting to only gag humor. The most memorable supporting character, however, is Tim Meadows as Sam, Dewey's drummer. Meadows is, like usual, right on point with his trademark delivery of ridiculously funny lines, including a few particular sequences involving drugs that are the funniest parts of the film. There are many big-name cameos including Harold Ramis, Frankie Muniz, Jack White, Eddie Vedder, Jackson Browne, Ghostface Killah, Jonah Hill, and Jack Black, Jason Schwartzman, Justin Long, and Paul Rudd as the best on-screen Beatles of all-time. The script was well written by Apatow and director Jake Kasdan, and from the first scene is packed tight with sharp dialogue and sprinkled with nonsensical, loony lines that will leave you wondering where they came from. Like any farce, the jokes tend to get somewhat repetitive, and some of the parody will go over the head of those who aren't music fans or haven't seen the movie being mocked. As in most Apatow-produced films, there is enough pointless nudity, extreme profanity, and genuine humor to make everyone laugh at some point. Walk Hard, like a Cox concert, shouldn't be taken too seriously and may be best enjoyed with some type of drugs on hand.

Good for: Apatow fans, music fans, people who like parodies

Bad for: serious thinkers, people who don't like music, uptight people

The Gallery
The Surfer: *
The Film Maker: * * *