Walk Hard

It's admittedly a bit sad when a so-called music critic falls in love with the songs of "Walk Hard".

A wonderful music satire, a friend can't help chuckling to himself as he notices the similarities between "Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story" and the Queen-inspired "Bohemian Rhapsody". Myself, I am bewildered how much the Ray Charles-based "Ray" is similar to it, though I actually really like "Ray". The funny part is that it takes the most from Johnny Cash's life - though I haven't seen "Walk the Line", Cash's second marriage to a songwriter of equal merit to him and the proximity to the beginning of rock n' roll are clear indicators.

It's clear everyone in production loves music. For one, The Temptations, Eddie Vedder and Ghostface appear in the film. Frankie Muniz plays Buddy Holly (he looks perfect) and Jack White plays a de-light-ful Elvis. (Some of the joy in watching the film comes from the cast list - Harold Ramis delivers the best "Pizza pie? What's in a pizza pie?") There's Dewey's wonderful first song, "Take My Hand", and the moral reaction to it. And you can't really dislike a film where the Beatles, played by Paul Rudd and Jack Black, in their thickest worst Liliputian accent bicker in an ashram.

With a film that doesn't take itself seriously - the kid to die says ominous lines such as "There's nothing I won't do with this long, long life of mine", "That's what's great about being young: so much time to do great things" - you wouldn't expect the songs to be good. But they're really good. A great example is the punk version of "Walk Hard" which in its incoherent fastness really does sound like a legit Ramones song - you can definitely bop to it.

A Life Without You (Is No Life At All)

The Roy Orbison-influenced track, "A Life Without You (Is No Life At All)", I suppose based on "Crying", is my favorite. I'm embarassed I love it so much to be playing it on repeat.

With or without post-production, John C. Reily is a really good singer. When he belts out the chorus of the song, I actually get a little teary-eyed. From a fake song! He is either doing a really good job convincing you of his guilt, or he is tricking the biggest simpleton in the world i.e. me.

So it goes:

I have the perfect life
I have the perfect wife

which reminds you Kristen Wiig, not long ago, said: "You will never get anything but love and support from me for you and your dreams." But I digress.

I don't know why
I sit and cry...
And now I miss you so,
Please don't let me go

all pretty substandard lyrics, until, and this part always gets me, he sings,

I make mistakes, and that is true,
At least I learn each time, I do,

before jumping into an orgy.

But there's something about the context of that orgy that making the lyrics more upsetting. You often hear lyricists of Cox's type singing about the mistakes they make, but having an actual image in your head, however comical, to bring up to the lyrics makes them more compelling.

Then there's this cliche:

Tears fall in vain,
I'm standing in the rain,
No matter how I feel,
I never seem to know what's real

followed by this ridiculous image:

So sharpen up your knives,
Stab me in the eyes,
I want to cry bursts of blood,
I want to drown myself in your love

That little couplet, "No matter how I feel / I never seem to know what's real", seems like an actual burst of existential angst, more fit for Nirvana than Roy. There is something beautiful about the imagery of water, through tears and rain, finally through biblical floods of blood, even though it's absurd Dewey is asking to be stabbed in the eyes.

The violence he commits to himself in the second stanza of the song brings him back to the ruthlessly pitiful chorus:

Darling you must believe
I could never leave you if I tried...
A life without you
Is no life at all

which you know he does not believe, but there is something about the song where you can see a genuine glimmer of sadness beyond his rockabilly suit.

I like the Elvis sad songs, but I love this song for whatever reason. I think it actually comes from the fact that it's a fake song - having seen the film, there is a reality to the song that frames the song as absurd, but absurd to the point of being really, really, miserably sad. Everyone in the film is devoid of agency to the point where rather than sharing their grief you laugh at their miseries. You're not a monster because you are laughing at the wink-wink script. But when you have a genuinely good song, with a genuinely gut-wrenching performance by John C. Reily, it makes you feel as good music ought to make you feel - with the added dimension that the singer, unlike a real human being, really cannot change, stuck in a world written by Hollywood writers playing God who do not permit him happiness. That kind of cruelty is so near to the true cruelty of real life.

I get genuinely affected by it. Perhaps I really am right to think it's a great song. But safer to think I'm a fool.