Review by Pamela
Zoslov
I believe “Not
Fade Away” by Buddy Holly is the best song title in rock and roll.
It's also the name of Sopranos creator
David Chase's feature film debut, which refreshingly isn't a
gangster story but a paean to 1960s rock and roll. That sounds
promising, but the movie is a disappointingly patchy piece of work,
entertaining in places but strangely lacking overall coherence. The
movie does feature some great vintage TV footage (The Rolling Stones
on “Dean Martin's Hollywood Palace”!), a first-class soundtrack curated by “Little Steven” Van Zandt (who played Silvio on The
Sopranos), and a handful of arresting scenes.
Chase's affection
for rock music was amply displayed in The Sopranos,
woven into the series' ominous landscape, the haunting mood set by
Tony Soprano driving on the New Jersey Turnpike to the sounds of
Alabama 3's “Woke Up This Morning (Chosen One).” And Not Fade Away is at its best when portraying the electrifying effect of the
early rock bands on ordinary suburban teens, with images of teens
sitting transfixed by images of a swaggering Mick Jagger singing “I
Just Wanna Make Love to You” on TV, or discovering Bo Diddley and
Leadbelly and Robert Johnson through the British rock musicians who
popularized them. “How is it the English knew all about the blues
and we didn't, even though it was right under our noses?” wonders
Douglas (John Magaro), the curly-haired young lead singer of an
aspiring rock band in suburban New Jersey. If only Not Fade Away focused more on the transformational nature of music in the '60s,
rather than trying to tell a desultory story about some sulky
teenagers, it might really have been something.
The
movie, which spans a period from 1963 to the late '60s, is anchored
by Douglas' family, headed by gruff paterfamilias Pat (James
Gandolfini, in a role that's hardly a stretch), who disapproves of
most things, including “The Twilight Zone” (“Send that one back
to the Indians!”) and the rock and roll that has captivated his son
Douglas, who plays drums in a band with his friends. Douglas' mom is basically a cartoon, ironing clothes in curlers like
Hairpray's Edna
Turnbull and occasionally crying out in exasperation, “I'm going to
kill myself!” and its equally unfunny alternate, “I'm going to
slit my wrists!” A neighboring family is similarly lampoonish, but
wealthier: the Dietzes, headed by Jack (Christopher McDonald), who
loudly expresses racist and pro-war attitudes common to the era — not much
shading or complexity in this screenplay. The Dietz daughters are
pretty, doe-eyed Grace (Bella Heathcote), who becomes Douglas' fickle
girlfriend, and her older sister Joy (Dominique McElligott), a
budding hippie and conceptual artist who's branded a lunatic by her
parents.
Chase
manages to address so many issues that affected Americans in the '60s
– civil rights, Vietnam, long hair, free love – but the film is
defeated by its focus on something relatively boring, the desultory
ambitions of a skillful but directionless garage band. In this way
it's reminiscent of the inferior Sopranos episodes
focusing on Meadow and her college friends rather than Tony and his
entertaining mob cohorts. Only two scenes really capture the viewer's
attention, and they seem like sketches for other movies: in one, Joy
is hauled off on a gurney to an asylum, and little sister Grace runs
tearfully down the corridor. In the other, Gandolfini's Pat, who's
dying of lymphoma, has dinner with his son in a restaurant and
reveals some hidden truths about his life.
Entertaining
movies have been made about rock bands pursuing fame and fortune, but
Not Fade Away doesn't seem to find much of a story in that
experience. There's an interesting drama lurking in the band's
typical rock-band clashes — conflicting egos, styles and ambitions
– but they are barely explored. Early on, Wells (Will Brill)
decides that Douglas, the drummer, should replace Eugene (Jack
Huston, handsome grandson of John) as lead singer; Douglas' vocals
are “more soulful,” and Wells, while a fine guitarist, is
flamboyant and a bit of an embarrassment. (In my view, they should
have kept the tall, good-looking guy rather than the short curly-haired
nerd as lead singer, but no one asked me.) Later, Wells is betrayed
by his ambitious bandmates, and is especially hurt by Wells, who's
his best friend from childhood. There are missed opportunities
aplenty here. Nothing that happens over the film's span of years has
much consequence — not the demo record the band makes, or its
chance to sign a record contract, or even the serious motorcycle
accident suffered by one of the band members.
All
of
this —not to mention Pat's cancer and Joy's commitment —
amounts to no more than a shrug, and certainly much less than the
testament to the “enormous power of rock and roll” spoken of in
the curious narrated afterword that closes the movie, just before
Douglas' little sister dances weirdly down a Los Angeles boulevard to
the Sex Pistols' cover of “Road Runner.”
