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Rock of Ages2012 | 123 min | PG-13 | 2.39:1
Using the blockbuster success of “Mamma Mia!” as inspiration, the Broadway musical “Rock of Ages” gallops to the big screen in all of its neon-drenched glory. Merging the sonic power of hair metal from the late-1980s with campy performances intended to reach all the way to the back row, the feature is nothing short of a party, with glitzy actors prowling around the frame, belting out power ballads and anthems regardless of vocal ability. Director Adam Shankman plays the material as broadly as humanly possible, blasting the music, the costumes, and the hair at full volume, hoping to razzle-dazzle summertime audiences looking for a thrill that doesn’t emerge from the pages of a comic book. It’s a lively picture, beaming with energy and excess, evoking a debauched era of music and sexual gamesmanship with an exaggerated sway. It’s only a shame “Rock of Ages” is quite awful, because it looks like it was a ton of fun to make. 
The year is 1987, and the place to be on the Sunset Strip is The Bourbon Room, run by owner Dennis (Alec Baldwin) and lackey Lonny (Russell Brand), who are depending on a performance from superstar Stacee Jaxx (Tom Cruise) to help them out of monetary troubles. Fresh off the bus from Oklahoma is Sherrie (Julianne Hough), an aspiring singer finding love with Bourbon Room employee Drew (Diego Boneta), inspiring the young man to chase his dreams of rock stardom, lured into a devil of a deal by Stacee’s sleazy manager, Paul (Paul Giamatti). Constance (Malin Akerman) is a Rolling Stone reporter sent to cover Jaxx’s big show, only to be seduced by the spaced-out frontman, who finds that her questions reveal parts of his life he wasn’t prepared to face. Also in the mix is Patricia (Catherine Zeta-Jones, in her first major screen role in five years), the wife of the Mayor of Los Angeles (Bryan Cranston), and a woman determined to destroy Jaxx with her gifts of public protest in front of the Bourbon Room. Shankman has jazz-handsed around these parts before, guiding 2007’s “Hairspray” to box office riches, finding the former choreographer comfortable in his wheelhouse overseeing manic singing and dancing. “Rock of Ages” doesn’t share the same spirit as “Hairspray,” trading doo-wop for heavy guitars and jewel-encrusted Beelzebub codpieces, looking to emphasize the decadence of the hair metal era, with all of its drinking and sex. No drugs here, oddly, replaced with a parade of flesh, finding the cast in all stages of undress to underline the sinful stomp of the Sunset Strip, combining burnouts, leeches, stargazers, and wannabes in one square block. The big-haired stew permits the production a chance to explore archetypes of every kind, gifting the cast full license to take their characterizations as over-the-top as they please, putting faith in a soundtrack of hits and misses to help glue the disparate elements together. 
Shankman has blinding color, a million lights, a cast hungry to play, kitsch up the wazoo, and a roster of familiar tunes, but he doesn’t have a story, at least one worth investing in. Altered radically from its stage roots, “Rock of Ages” has been defanged and rendered inert in its cinematic form, with the plot splitting off into five directions of limited emotional value. These are caricatures, not people, with a sustained cartoon spin to the whole effort, leaving Shankman confused about which subplot to follow to fruition. The arc of Stacee Jaxx is perhaps the most grueling, introduced here as a comfortably enigmatic supporting player, only to watch the script find ways to increase the rocker’s screen time, effectively wiping out the love story between Sherrie and Drew. Lonny and Dennis also feel superfluous to the tale, especially with abysmal screenwriting that forces cruddy one-liners on Baldwin and encourages Brand to amplify his propensity to annoy. As for an antagonist, Zeta-Jones’s Patricia initially carries the workload, embodying the Tipper Gore/PMRC movement with wild-eyed abandon. It doesn’t take long for Shankman to get bored with his villain, pushing the character out of the movie until the finale. “Rock of Ages” offers a chaotic cluster of faces and places, unable to merge the experience into a single stream of dramatic intention, leaving behind a flashy film of yearning characters that carries no resonance whatsoever. While the compilation of booming tracks should be the saving grace of “Rock of Ages,” the aural overload is actually more of a detriment, with the soundtrack producers relying heavily on mashups to generate the command of opposing forces onscreen. The braided effect truly only works once, when Patricia and the parents belt out “We’re Not Gonna Take It” in front of the Bourbon Room, while Lonny and the headbangers respond with “We Built This City.” The rest of the stitch jobs are awkward and repetitive, peeling the natural progression out of the music. 
Of course, if the appearance of a Starship song in a film about hair metal sounds odd, “Rock of Ages” might infuriate those who appreciate their squealing guitars smeared with lipstick. Tunes by Poison, Bon Jovi, Whitesnake, and Warrant are present, but Styx, Foreigner, and Quarterflash are also represented in this specific fantasy world, throttling the potency of the mix with unwanted detours into flaccid classic rock numbers. The lack of Cinderella, Motley Crue, and Kiss (who basically made a prequel to this musical with their 1988 single, “Let’s Put the X in Sex”) is beyond strange, missing an opportunity to singe the audience with an authentic lava flow of ridiculous and irresistible sex anthems from hairy men in heels and their big drums. And who better to belt out these global hits than actors who can’t sing? At least Cruise and Giamatti are genuine amateurs, in way over their heads with enormous tunes that require plenty of studio knob twirling to navigate. Cruise’s performance as Jaxx is disappointing all-around, creating a Romero-zombie stalk to the superstar that results in aimless scenes of indeterminate purpose, but onstage, the actor looks uncomfortable, overcompensating with vein-popping flash to maintain Jaxx’s authority. Frankly, it looks like the rock god is trying to pass a kidney stone. Hough is also miscast in a pivotal role, with her thin, bland voice unable to wrap around the songs as needed, losing the thrust of Sherrie’s vocal journey from country girl to L.A. stripper. Boneta fares better, but seems equally unprepared to take the tunes where they need to go. However, nothing tops the sight of Baldwin in a bad wig and tight clothes belting out songs he clearly wants nothing to do with. The grotesqueness of such a visual is almost worth a recommendation. 
“Rock of Ages” is eager to please, finding Shankman encouraging his ensemble to act as though the show is still on Broadway, making sure every dramatic beat and motivation is plainly spelled out for the audience. There’s even a baboon (Jaxx’s sidekick, Hey Man) to provide wacky animal reactions, just in case the crowds don’t get the jokes. It’s exhausting to watch, but never fulfilling, constructing a Halloween fashion show instead of a searing concert of musical confessions and desires, stretched like spandex over a collection of powerhouse singles from a wild era of songwriting. “Rock of Ages” plays like a practical joke that’s gone too far. Starring: Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Julianne Hough, Russell Brand, Bryan Cranston Director: Adam Shankman » See full cast & crew |
 
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