Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Ricki and the Flash

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Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 08-29-2015, 05:44 PM:

I have a lot of respect for Jonathan Demme. He directed one of the all time great concert movies, Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense; and he directed one of the all time great movies of any genre, The Silence of the Lambs. Which begs the question, what on Earth attracted him to Diablo Cody's script for Ricki and the Flash? Indeed, what on Earth attracted silver screen heavy weights, Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline to the project? Clearly it looked much better on paper.

Cody's script about an aging Lita Ford-type rocker who fritters her life away in rock'n'roll while neglecting her responsibility to her three children has little going for it. The story has Ricki making a belated attempt to reconnect with her adult children after her daughter suffers a messy, emotionally damaging divorce. The tension which exists between Ricki and her cynical and sardonic children, and her hard working well-to-do ex-husband and his new wife, is excruciating for the most part. There's just no getting around the obvious fact that Ricki has made this bed for herself and her family rightly hates her for it. Her feeble attempts to make it right are both sad and pathetic and watching her do it is torturous for the audience. A strange mix for a film which presents itself as light weight entertainment.

The one pleasant surprise in the movie is the inclusion of Rick Springfield. It's easy to be cynical about plucking an 80's pop music heartthrob out of nowhere to play an older version of himself. It seems an unabashed attempt to attract a certain demographic to the movie, and it probably is, but the truth is Springfield gives a heart felt, albeit limited, performance - indeed, he is the heart of the movie.

Streep is unimpressive; merely dishing up a stereotypical cliché of her character and it's painful to watch her vaudeville performance. Kevin Kline is Kevin Kline.

Finally the film attempts to lambast us with "feel good" ending but after all we've endured, it stretches credulity to believe that a happy family could be instantly born through the power of music alone.

4 out of 10

Posted by Terry Monohan (Member # 8285) on 08-31-2015, 12:08 PM:

Watched this movie at the big Del Mar Theatre in Santa Cruz CA this past week. Looked so great on the wide large downstairs scope screen. I mainly went to see the previews, pre show organ music and the curtain go up and down plus get out of the outside hot heat but I liked the whole film so I stayed till the end. It was much better then I heard. The movie is not all music plus I saw the waterfall curtains close after the credits. You won't find curtains in many theatres these days that work and they close them after the trailers and re open on the main feature with organ fanfare! Check out this movie you may like It.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 09-02-2015, 10:07 AM:

well it was ten times better than 'Rachel Getting Married' - ugh, I couldn't stand that film. personally I loved the music in this. All in all though, good not great (3 out of 5 stars)

Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 09-02-2015, 02:55 PM:

I thought the music was OK but I didn't like the sound mix. It didn't seem beefy enough to me and the bass was weak. Maybe I just needed to crank it a little more.

I did think it was kind of cool the way they handled the music during the end credits. They showed the "last song" played live by the band, and then when that ended the music shifted to a different style of music played at a lower volume. The exact same thing happens at the end of most rock concerts.

Posted by James Wyrembelski (Member # 9037) on 09-11-2015, 02:11 PM:

It wasn't you Mike

I thought the same thing. Needed some more oomph.