Coyote Ugly

Rating: 4/10 (10 March 2011)

I knew about this film for two reasons, the big actor from The Flintstones being in it, and the successful song, I was certainly interested, from director David McNally (Kangaroo Jack) and producer Jerry Bruckheimer (Top Gun, The Rock, Con Air). Basically Violet Sanford (The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle's Piper Perabo) is an aspiring teenage songwriter, and she finally gets her dream of going professional going when she leaves home and heads for New York City. She finds herself a place to stay, but her efforts to give her demo tape to a music producer are useless, and then her apartment gets broken into leaving her with nothing. Feeling useless she gets some lunch with what she has left, and by coincidence she overhears some girls who work at a bar as they say goodbye to worker Zoe (Tyra Banks). This leads Violet to the Coyote Ugly bar, run by Lil (Maria Bello), who gives her a chance behind the bar to experience what goes on, and Violet is surprised to see that it is a very raunchy bar, the girls call the shots, they thrust moves on the bar counter, and the attraction of what pulls in the punters. Lil warned her that she may not last long at the bar, but after meeting Kevin O'Donnell (Adam Garcia) she learns more of the ways of the city, and gains a bit more confidence to work in the bar, she also auctions him off to get money she needed. But what she really needs is confidence on stage, as her demo tapes aren't gaining the interest, so she needs to sing the songs herself live and maybe get some attention that way, and Kevin tries to help her with her stage fright. One night while working in Coyote Ugly there is an incident that causes a fight, so Violet grabs the microphone and sings along to the song on the jukebox, Blondie's "One Way or Another", and that gains the bar some more punters. Violet's toll-booth father Bill (John Goodman) does find out about the bar and doesn't approve seeing what goes on, and there is a point when he has a car accident, but he survives and supports his daughter with any decision she wants to make. After having a disagreement with each other, Kevin returns to give her confidence as well, and she completes a new song ready to present at a live show for newcomer singers, musicians and writers. In the end, Violet initially still has stage fright, but Kevin helps her and she gets through her song gaining high interest, and of course in the end a professional singer, LeAnn Rimes comes to Coyote Ugly to perform her song with her, and a proud Bill gets auctioned. Also starring Izabella Miko as Cammie, Bridget Moynahan as Rachel, Heavenly Creatures' Melanie Lynskey as Gloria, Del Pentecost as Lou and Johnny Knoxville as College Guy. Perabo is pretty good in the lead role, Goodman gets his humorous moments, including that scene where he lies about eating a vegetable meal when it is in fact KFC and going "yum", the raunchy is obviously very easy to enjoy, the music soundtrack is all good, the story is pretty much a cross between Flashdance and Cocktail, it may be a little predictable, but "Can't Fight The Moonlight" by LeAnn Rimes is a fantastic number one hit song, it's not a bad romantic comedy drama at all. Okay!