Les Commitments

I've lived in Detroit all my life, and the great soul music of the 1960's and 70's which was created here (and is still enjoyed here) is featured throughout "The Commitments." The Irish lads and lasses really do up the soul staples, from "Try a Little Tenderness" to "Mustang Sally." The actual musical talent is reinforced by the strong character development, industrial setting (North Dublin), and masterful plot, adapted from the novel of the same name by Roddy Doyle. "Say it once, say it loud...I'm black and I'm proud," is never more irreverently humorous than when questionably repeated by Jimmy Rabbite's soul disciples. I own this film, and I could watch it over and over. The soundtrack is excellent, and the pop culture references throughout the movie are hilarious (especially during the audition scene.) This film delighted both the hard-core Detroiter in me, as well as the Irish lass. The working class Irish youth depicted in the movie are sincere, and so is their project, The Commitments. (All the great bands were a "The ...")

Who needs expensive movie stars when a group of unknowns can light up the screen like this lot?

On paper, it sounds like a failure - a cast comprising almost entirely of untrained and untested performers, set in working class Dublin, based on the novella by Roddy Doyle. By God, does it defy expectations.

Jimmy Rabbitte is a working class Dublin lad who's been collecting unemployment benefits for two years. But he dreams of bigger things, namely making it big in the music industry. He sets out to form a soul band, and assembles a motley crew of musicians and singers, most of whom don't know each other and many of whom can't stand each other.

The look of the film is gritty and realistic - nothing is glossed over. North Dublin is presented in all it's glory. The home lives of the band members are depicted warts and all - their private lives set the scene for the inevitable personality clashes that are almost as explosive as the music. In the mix is the unique character of the Irish people - at one point Jimmy enters a tenement block and, as he waits for the lift, looks over to see a boy with a horse. "You aren't taking that in the lift, are you?" he asks. "I have to," the boy replies. "The stairs would kill him."

The real star of the show is the music - this film spawned two hugely successful soundtrack albums. The band members were cast partly due to their musical ability, and the results are superlative. The stand out is Andrew Strong as Deco - would you believe this kid was only 16 when the film was made? His amazing voice belies his tender years, and suggests that he's been smoking a packet a day since the age of about four. At the end of the day with is a fine ensemble piece, much like the band. The acting may be a little wonky at times, but the hysterical dialogue makes up for that.

Most remarkably, this is a feel good film that does not rely on any of the conventional feel good plot devices. There are no group hugs, no plot conveniences, no trite happy endings. Just a shrewdly observed and wittily captured human story about people who dream of making it out of their dreary world. And isn't that something we can all relate to?

I first heard of the Commitments when I heard someone playing the soundtrack on their car radio. I quickly bought myself a copy and played it about 10 times a day - the music and the singing were unlike anything I'd ever heard before, even though all the songs are covers.

It wasn't until about 6 months later that the film was on an obscure cable channel, and I literally got goosebumps as soon as the opening credits rolled with "Treat her right". It was so incredible to actually see the characters performing the songs that I'd grown to love. It all became complete actually seeing the story unfold, and by the end you're really rooting for the band to succeed. When they perform "Try a Little Tenderness" I've never managed to watch that scene without tears in my eyes, it's such a fantastic version of the song and the energy Andrew Strong brings to it is just incredible, especially as he was only 16 at the time.

Anyone who loves music has to see this film, even you're not familiar with soul music - I promise you'll be hooked after seeing The Commitments!

Alan Parker's brilliant directing effort on THE COMMITMENTS really shines. More than an entertaining spectacle, it has a whole lot of influence on the soul music circuit. Shots of Dublin city life are nicely photographed. The musical acts are extremely well talented and well done, if only the occasional dialogue breaks didn't interrupt the awesome sound. There could've been some more new tunes instead of old ones, but it's amazing to discover the fictional band's lead singer pull them off out of his lungs. Phenomenal! At least you can try to find the soundtrack album. One thing stands out the best: the casting. We need more of today's movies to do the same thing: to provide creative acting talents. The musical genre of modern Hollywood needed something like this to keep it afloat. Highly recommended!

There's a reason why working-class areas are darlings for sport or music-themed 'Cinderella' films: when you come from a poor neighborhood, that's almost the only options you have. So there's a truth-to-life that Alan Parker effectively explored in "Fame" and that he transposed in the Northside of Dublin with a more cynical tone, less inclined to tell an inspirational underdog story à la "Fame", but tailor-made for the 90s.

"The Commitments" is adapted from Roddy Doyle's tale of an Irish band that invented 'Dublin soul' and it is indeed a boisterous, energetic, funny and vibrant ode to soul music, invigorated by the kind of youthful spontaneousness that works like a double-edged sword as sometimes what makes great bands can also undo them. Still, there's something inspirational in the central protagonist Jimmy Rabbitte (Robert Arkins): a man with a vision and a mission so incongruous it could actually work.

Jimmy worships soul for it's the music that best conveys the emotional turmoil of the average man... much more it's a genre that requires vocals, bassists, a chorus, trumpetists, saxophonists, drummers, it's a combination of collective forces rather than the clashes of egos that killed so many bands before. "The Commitments" will commit to their music and stick together, at least on the paper.

Jimmy insists on that with the same damn seriousness as the 'Blues Brothers' who feel like they're on a mission from God. And in the film's most infamous sequence where he shows James Brown as a model to measure up to, Felim Gormley (at the sax) asks him if they're not too 'white' for that and Jimmy's answer establishes that 'skin' is a matter of opinion, and what counts is how much of an outcast you feel in your own world. That line makes a subtle bridge with "Fame" and as Parker said: any poor kid from London or Detroit could identify with the Commitments.

That said, he didn't forget to provide that Irish texture with a fair share of folk music, a little Riverdance and accents that are literally written on subtitles: "bollix" and "eejit" are new words I entered in my vocabulary. He doesn't always dodge the clichés (there had to be a bar brawl) but Parker assembled a fine gallery of young lads and lasses from Ken McCluskey and Glen Hansard at the guitar to Andrew Strong as the singer whose success went up his pony-tailed head. The Commitmettes are Imelda (Angeline Ball) the pretty one with distracting skirts, Bronagh Gallagher as Bernie the mousy fish-and-ship vendor with the sweetest voice and there's Nathalie (Maria Doyle Kennedy) who has a crush on Jimmy. As for the drummers, the hot-temper issue turns into a running-gag almost as memorable as in "Spinal tap".

Speaking of which, there are times where I wondered if Parker was so transported by the rock music he let it roll toward "mockumentary" territory. I'm not sure the film needed this musical sequence full of comical snippets such as the band rehearsing in an abattoir, a bus, on the streets women were hanging their laundry, sometimes all you need is a simple line such as "I feel like Madonna" or the group training while Bernie is babysitting. The rawness is lost in these trailer-baity scenes while sometimes comedy is best taken on small doses: the confession scene where the priest corrects Steven (Michael Aherme) about the singer of "When a Man Loves a Woman" is one of the film's highlights, and it's funny as hell.

Speaking of priest, the most inspired casting is Joey the Lips (Johnny Murphy) who talks about soul like preaching a gospel, his smile is the vector of cohesion in the whole group, and he seems to have an endless list of name-dropping anecdotes and even one that include the idol of Jimmy's father (Colm Meaney) Elvis Presley whose portrait is hanged above the Pope's. It's very unlikely that he tells the truth but the point is that you don't have to be credible to build a band but be a band first and build credibility afterwards.

And the road to glory contains many many steps: from the failed auditions with door closing on wannabe Joan Baez or Boy George to getting the equipment and then the first gigs in local churches or pubs, the real challenge isn't to prevent an eventual power outage but to contain the anger and the egos of the band members who complain about the lack of wages, the tight schedules, the arrogance of Deco who acts like a prima donna or Joey who gets all the girls ... the musical interludes make us appreciate how talented they are and yet how unprofessionally they constantly behave backstage.

I concede the arguments get a little repetitive, the film insists too much on that point as if it was trying to warn us that this time Cinderella wouldn't find the Prince... and that the collective dream would crash under the reality of individuals. Anyway, I kept thinking of "The King of Comedy" with Rabbite trying to imagine an interview to a journalist which is exactly what people with dreams of glory have in mind and that reveals maybe his desire to form a group is to fulfill some narcissistic void. But still, it was nice while it lasted and paraphrasing Rupert Pumpkin, at least we know they will never be schmucks for a lifetime, they were kings for a night, and many other nights.

"The Commitments" is one of these films that had to exist, I can imagine Parker wanting to make that film, posting announcements on newspapers, auditioning, having to handle all these clashing egos as well and coming to the final product, the making of film echoes its own point, if the film about that band could be made, then the band could exist.... And always hand-in-hand with its fictional content, the film didn't even do well in the box-office, but you know as Joey the Lips said, even that was poetry.