Spinning Gold

A mediocre film that is neither overly bad nor overly good.

The casting is mediocre, some actors are solid in their roles and some are simply miscast. We follow the life of music producer Neil Bogart, his rise, as well as some famous musicians who collaborated with him.

The film is interesting at times, but it's simply mediocre, it's not that bad overall, but unfortunately it didn't live up to its potential.

Some of the supporting characters are interesting, like Big Joey, played by the excellent Vincent Pastore. But there is too little of him in the film, which simply doesn't look cinematic enough, it lacks the look that a different camera or perhaps a better director would give it.

The movie isn't a complete failure, but it's not the kind of movie you watch and think you'll watch again. This is a movie that you watch once and that's it.

There was a lot of potential, the seventies, the music, various famous musicians, but none of it was fully exploited. I don't know how to explain it other than that the film is too polished, it doesn't have the intensity it should have.

Jeremy Jordan isn't that bad as the main character, but he isn't great either. Some actors are unconvincing in their roles and don't even look like the famous characters they portray.

The film also lacks a bit more original music from the period and the story is incoherent at certain points, the script just isn't good enough. It's watchable, but that's all, it leaves the impression of another mediocre achievement that could have been much better.

In the end, it's a shame that this movie didn't live up to the potential it had.

It's a biopic of Neil Bogart (Jeremy Jordan) who co-founded Casablanca Records. In 1974, they are a new company with only one act on their roster. It's KISS. Neil is having an affair with KISS manager Joyce Biawitz (Lyndsy Fonseca) while his wife Beth (Michelle Monaghan) is at home with the kids.

It's an interesting story that I'm not familiar with. I do know all the songs, but they are a little before my time. The lead needs to be a star. Jeremy Jordan does a fine job. In fact, he's probably very close to the real Neil Bogart. A leading man role does require the biggest star that they can get. As for directing and writing, it's a mistake for Neil's son to do the job. He's also not the most experienced. It's a bit of his father's gambling mentality. He's betting on himself, but the film would benefit from someone better than him. In the end, the songs are great and the story is compelling. The filmmaking is average at best. It's a passable biopic.

My rating (6) is higher then the movie actually deserves.. This has to do that I'm greatfull to learn the origin some of my music. Not using the original music tracks is a big miss of the true feeling in my hart. No discredit to Donna Summer actrice Tylor Parks, but she does not have the voice or image of Donna Summer. I'm sure it has to do with the original song rights where proberly to expensive to use in the movie. That's a real shame because it would give the movie much more credit. The acting is oke-ish, but story play is poor. I had people that just walked out of the cinema that could not look at it anymore. (...) second half of the movie was better. But it took to long to be involved as a viewer.

I had high expectations here and this movie didn't come close to meeting them. At it's core is an amazing story, but they failed to tell it with any suspense, compassion or coniction. The trailer sells you on inside details of every act on the label, but for the most part, we only get to know Kiss and Donna Summer.

The biggest problem with this film is none of the talent looks like who they are portraying. Kiss has 5 decades of Cosplayers and every one of those fans looks better than the clown squad they assembled for this film. Not a single member looks like the actual band member and Gene Simmons looks like he's about 5"6' and that is with the platform boots. Tall talent in real life is portrayed by short people. Thin people like Gladys Knight are portrayed by a fat woman, and short people like George Clinton are portrayed by talent a full foot taller.

As much as I tried to get into this movie, the poor portrayals kept pulling me out. The music also was poorly done again removing me from the fantasy.

There are two reasons this movie is going to tank. 1) its target audience is most likely retired or pushing it. 2) it's not true enough to the people to satisfy the crowd. This was a watered-down remake of Rock of Ages. A poor parody or of poor movie. That's what happens when you allow the family of the subject to run the show. These kids are not film makers and it shows in every scene.

I will give the director (son of the man this movie is about) credit. Watching this movie from beginning to end (or rather listening to the narration, A clear sign this movie was bad) made me interested in his dad. Ironically, I became so interested that I felt this man deserved a better movie about himself.

It was over bloated with too much stuff that could not be gel together well. Possibly would have been better as a series of episodes in which each musical act was on focus (If it was a series, I would give it a higher rating simply because of the Kiss episode).

Its funny that the movie is about the filmmaker's father because it felt like the man himself directed it as a stoke to his own ego.

Literally, the film was a man telling me how awesome he is and realistic that could have been done in a podcast or Youtube video. These days listening to some one talk for over two hours seems like better time management than watching a boring biopic.