Songbird

JoAnne Skye (Cobie Smulders) is a 90's rock star. The "Filthy Dukes" is her band. Her stardom is now faded and she's struggling to keep going. When her band finally quits, she reconnects with an old friend Sara Ramsey (Jessica Hynes) living in a caravan and decides to be an university student. She has a fling with administrator Pete (Richard Elis).

Firstly, I adore Cobie Smulders, and Jessica Hynes for Spaced. The 4 rating concerned me but also intrigued me. I can see the problems but it's not quite that bad. This was apparently much improvised, and shot in five days. It looks and feels it. It needs a few more written scenes and to extend it to a full week. It tries to cover with some montage sequences. Smulders could do a little singing but the opening music video is too inferior. I would suggest lip sync. There are a few good songs in the movie. It's fine to pick one of them and have her lip sync it. As for the characters, I like the destructiveness of Smulders, the buried jealousy of Hynes, and Elis' innate niceness. There is a lot to like here but it is still not good enough.

This is an improvisational piece filmed in five days by Jamie Adams. Cobie Smulders plays Joanne, a 90's rock musician who enrolls in college after her band breaks up.Then fate brings her together with super sexy Peter (Richard Elis). This is a story about a girl who thinks she is everything and a man who lacks confidence coming together and finding love. Don't watch and expect a big production, this movie is like reality; stumbling people, clumsy, awkward and chaotic. All the things people criticized this movie for are actually the things that make this movie stand out and make it real. Cobie did a great job playing the rock musician. If you think she was loud and over the top, that was probably what she was aiming for, but all credits for making this movie great go to Richard for bringing sweetness and sensitivity.

I was expecting very little from this movie. From the Blu-ray cover, I thought I'd make it through 10 minutes before turning it off. The first few "documentary" style minutes were not very good. But, once it got down to the narrative, this was a thoroughly entertaining love story.

To appreciate this, you need to be able to watch very low budget, almost home made quality movies. The acting and characters made up for the unpleasing visual aesthetic. This is from the UK, so it's character driven, not standard 3-Act-Structure.

For what it is, it's damn entertaining. I know I'll watch again, actually quite a few more times.

It's a keeper.

I don't know what people expected but I really don't understand why there is so much hate towards this movie. It was exactly what I wanted it to be. The lead character Joanne is an extraverted, outspoken person who says and does whatever she wants. She makes people uncomfortable trom time to time and that's what makes her real. She doesn't have her life even remotely figured out. The movie shows life exactly as it is. Improvisation is the point of the whole thing. There are no great lines, suprising twists or love at first sight. It's everyday events that lead to people forming bonds with each other . I think the movie is great and you should give it a try.

I do try my best to approach films with an open mind, even if I happen to see bad reviews, low ratings, etc. here on IMDB or on, say, Rotten Tomatoes. That said, the many scathingly bad reviews posted for this film did make it hard to watch with an unbiased mind, and I suppose I was on the lookout for the usual "bad movie" red flags. Sadly, there were many. That said, given the subject matter (and given that I am a musician with a lot of experiences over the years, both good and bad, in bands), I really do think I went into it wanting to like this movie. Unfortunately, those bad reviews were well justified. This movie was embarrassingly bad. I am not familiar with the actors playing the leads, but I would not be surprised if this film alone torpedoed their careers. The acting is so stupefyingly bad that I was forced to look away at some points, as if averting my eyes from someone picking their nose or scratching their back. The editing appeared to have been done in-camera, and the random, utterly nonsensical jump cuts reminded me of a home movie videographer trying to keep their clips short because they were worried they may run out of tape. As to the plot... what plot? If there was one, if there was anything, anything at all, that resembled some sort of coherent narrative, well, I missed it, sorry.

I can only say I am glad I borrowed this from the local library, so no money changed hands.

My totally unsolicited advice to the actors, writer, director, editor, producer, cinematographer, exec producer, composer(s), vfx team... don't quit your day jobs.