Noite de Abertura

I jumped at this movie because Anne Heche is in it. Unfortunately she's only in it briefly, but that's not a real problem. The real problem is that the story starts as a fun goofy comedy musical and becomes a sentimental love story and the segue is poorly done.

The plot revolves around Nick (Topher Grace) who is the back stage manager for a musical titled One Hit Wonders. The lead singer Brooke (Anne Heche) is knocked out and her understudy Chloe (Alona Tal) must take over and it's opening night with a full house. The rest of the cast is made of 'has-beens', 'hopefulls', 'burn-outs', and 'wanna-bes'. There are some fun musical numbers both on stage and back stage.

We learn that Nick was once a popular singer that gave up singing and he and Chloe are in love. Nick must learn a lesson and take a big step (for him) or he will loose Chloe. In the mean time everything that can go wrong back stage does go wrong and Nick is torn in two directions. Finally he takes his big step to get Chloe back and that moment in this musical comedy is too romantic and sentimental to blend into the previous comedy and screwball humor.

Watch it and judge for yourself!

Well color me happy there's a sofa in here for two! This must be one of the most entertaining movies I've seen in a long time. Such an amazing script (all those hilarious lines, all the pop culture references in every other sentence, the light-hearted self deprecating humor...), and such fantastic delivery, I tried to will it not to end. Excluding the cheesy AF unrealistic ending, I loved every scene. One has to be well-versed in the music and celebrity tidbits of the past three decades to get everything, to say the least, though.

There was also quite a bit of soul-searching for quite a few characters, and amazingly, it was all done smoothly and with just the right amount of depth. That's a tough thing to accomplish in such a short time, but they nailed it!

So yeah, I definitely recommend it. "Treat yo self".

Occasionally you get the movie about movies, or the play about plays, or - as it is in this case - a musical about musicals. I will give it what it's due: the music didn't feel out of place until the very end. I mean, it's a film about the musical business, of which it makes fun of for having people breaking into song for no good reason, so it makes sense to have people break into song all the time, especially if you like circular reasoning. And the acting was OK, although I really feel Topher Grace was pretty weak as a lead and the show was stolen by Taye Diggs, as always.

Other than that it is a straight stage movie, with the high stake opening night as a background, the fast pace of everything, having to work with people that are very different and often overdramatic, the obligatory romance between coworkers and the eventual stand-up ovation that was cringeworthy at the end.

So, I didn't feel the film opened any new world to me. I still dislike musicals and all they stand for and the antics of over-drugged drama queens are of no interest to me. If you like that kind of thing, you might enjoy this. Still I rate it low because I just thought it was a weak movie, not because of the subject matter.

I had not read about this movie when I watched it, but I was pleasantly surprised by the witty comments and references. It had me laughing quite a few times. I feel it is a bit of a "parody" in some ways, but no overkill by any means. It was a fun and easy watch. I think you have to like the genre musical, even if this is not a 100% musical. A bit goofy and silly overall, just as I like it. Cast was OK as well, good mix of known and less known. Movie of the year? No, but worth 1.5 hours in my opinion.

First of all, this must be the biggest backstage of a theatre in the universe and the loudest that isn't heard in the auditorium. The music arrangements are very good and the actors are enjoying themselves, which is what makes the film a lot of fun. It's a spoof of how it is in the theatre. The stage manager doesn't leave it's place during the performance, no one is that loud during performance, but a lot of stuff happens backstage during performance. The orchestra doesn't stop playing when things go wrong, The entire production makes sure that the audience doesn't realise the backstage fights, problems and faults that happens in front of them. But, again, it's a fun film.