Russel Brand is such a fucking mess, he is so oblivious to social mores, he is such a shagadelic monster, we go along with him
And Jonah Hill is such an everyman, such a Joe Average, and such an excellent substitute for the audience, we believe.
But this story of 72 hours in the life of a rock star and his handlerrequires zero knowlegde o the music biz to make any sense.
Not that it is unfunny. At times it is uproarious. But it is shallow and trivial and miscast and mishappen. The comparison isn’t with Spinal Tap. It is with My Favorite Year and you, Russell Brand, are no Peter O’Toole. With his long curlu hair, unshaven visage and scarecrow physique, Brand has no center of gravity. Nothing touches him. Brand is more Scott Wailand than Keith Richards. And the socks, half-baked glam rock parodies, are so bad , you need to really wonder who is buying this shit. When its tongue is in its cheek, Brand is very, very funny. But the transition to seriousness stops the movie
Jonah as a lower level employee at “Pinnacle Records” is simply excellent. He has so many many funny moments: having truly awful sex on a toilet (“my ass is getting wet”), smoking Jeffry -a ghastly “mostly grass, plus heroin mix, being chased down an aisle after a shot of adrenaline by a very good P.Diddy.
The movie couple have chemistry and the movie is fun si it might be a bit iffy to complain about what it isn’t. I mean it is obviously a fantasy, right? Also, the pieces don’t together well, the structure is too loose for comedy. If it was just a little better it would be a great movie and it is only a go0d little rock and roll fable.