Rock of Ages

Rock of Ages is one of those movies that I had an interest in seeing after the first trailer because even if the story and the acting were not so good, I would still get to see a movie full of songs from the '80's particularly from a lot of the hair bands, that in and of itself could make everything in the movie worth seeing. Rock of Ages while it is the story of two young musicians in Los Angeles who are working in The Bourbon Room, biding their time until they catch their own big break in the music business. While the movie was enjoyable I found it to be very different from what was promoted in the trailers. Based on the trailers you get a definite feeling that the movie centers around Tom Cruise's character of Stacee Jaxx and not the story between Sherie (Julianne Hough) and Drew (Diego Boneta). While what happens in the movie is different than the feeling of the story of the trailer, it did make sense because the marketing people who are in charge of putting butts in the seats, featuring Tom Cruise will get a better turn out to the theaters over two relatively unknowns in Hough and Boneta. In the end I found the performances and the songs to be what really worked for Rock of Ages and I felt the story could have been stronger to support everything else.

Even though his character is that of a supporting character Tom Cruise in the role of Stacee Jaxx was a very strong role for him. While I don't believe it to be to the same iconic role as Depp's Jack Sparrow, but I do think this is one of those roles that we will look back and view this as one of Cruise's stellar roles when looking back on his entire career. Cruise had all of the mannerisms one would expect from a lead man in an '80's hair band and he had them down pat. He played an eccentric rock star so perfectly and he had moments where he was so incoherent at times and made no sense that you truly believe he was an actual musician from the '80's. Julianne Hough and Diego Boneta in the roles of Sherie and Drew have a good amount of chemistry together. While this is the first movie I have seen either of these two act in and while I think both of them showed a lot of promise in their roles. While they did show a lot of potential talent I think that the roles did not ask either of them have to do more other then sing. The rest of the supporting cast for Rock of Ages all do great jobs. Catherine Zeta-Jones as the holier than thou woman out to take back the Sunset Strip bu waging a war against The Bourbon Room and Rock 'n' Roll was a lot better then what I thought she would do. Baldwin and Brand were the greatest comedy duo I have seen in a musical and they worked so well together.

Where the performances I found to be strong, I feel that the story really lacked a lot in the end. I felt that the story was almost non-existent and was almost just there to move from one song to the next. I wanted the story to have not only an actual depth, but give us more on the characters. I wanted to know what had happened with Jaxx in his past that took him down the path that led him to the point of when the movie took place. This lack of depth really hurt the overall story and in the end it could have made the movie even better in the end. With this being based on a Broadway musical and having not seen it I do not know how much the story may be different then the original, but I just really wanted more in the end. With a musical on stage the audience is their live and so you are drawn in a lot easier and so I think the story flows plays a smaller role.

Of course in the musical movie genre the music and singing is vital. In Rock of Ages the music does not disappoint. With technology today they can allow the actors to actually do the singing because they can auto-tune all of the actors to sound fairly decent, which for the Broadway musical they can not do. With a live stage musical the actors have to be actually able to sing as well. It made it really nice to be able to know when Cruise was singing that you could tell it was actually his voice and not some singer that is singing instead of Cruise. The music used from Journey, Poison, Def Leppard among others were perfect. This type of music is fun to listen to and is really catchy and really makes you want to sing along. The best singing aspect that took place in the entire movie was the duet for "I Can't Fight This Feeling Anymore" by Brand and Baldwin.This duet had me doubled over laughing throughout because both of them went all out in the selling of the duet.

Rock of Ages ended up being a fairly enjoyable movie that anyone can go in sit back, enjoy and they will recognize most of the songs that are played throughout. Tom Cruise's performance was spot on and he really went all in on this role. The songs are fun and even though the story was a little lackluster, I am still giving Rock of Ages three buckets of popcorn out of five. This movie is worth the price of a movie theater ticker. simply for the songs to be heard within a theater full with such great sound and amazing surround sound.