Required viewing for 80s music fans

Rating: 8/10 (15 March 2010)

Every 10 years or so, a musical comedy comes along that perfectly pegs a musical era. The late 70s would be "Spinal Tap". The 90s would be "Singles". And here, ladies & gentlemen of the 80s generation, we have "Music and Lyrics".
I don't know if post-80s people would understand the humour, but gawd I was in stitches right from the start. The film begins with an embarrassingly accurate rendition of an 80s pop video: moussed hair, tight pants, big-arm dancing, slutty nurses with bursting cleavage, the works! From there, the film focuses on one of the guys in the video, the self-proclaimed "happy has been" Alex (Hugh Grant), an ex-80s glamour boy who is now reduced to playing high school reunions and Six Flags themeparks to make a living. In many ways it's so accurate, it can't even be called a satire.
Even funnier is the spoof of today's booty music and Alex's attempt to integrate himself. He has 3 days to write a hit single for a pop diva, but despite his instrumental talents he has the lyric writing skills of a wet shoe (trying to rhyme "you and me" with "autopsy" haha). Then along comes Sophie (Drew Barrymore) who has a magical way of putting words together, though she herself comes with a handful of emotional baggage.
The plot is really not the point. The point of this film is--in the spirit of Spinal Tap--to mock the silliness of cultural crazes, particularly the 80s music that we all know so well (but are too embarrassed to admit). My fellow rejects from the 80s, this is your catharsis, a way of exorcising all the demons from your closets. You can laugh at the screen, but you're actually laughing at yourself & loving every minute.
Both Hugh & Drew deliver great, believable performances, and the script is fast paced & witty like an old Katharine Hepburn / Cary Grant picture. But what really made this a great film are the riotous performances by the supporting characters. Brad Garrett ("Everybody Loves Raymond"), Kristen Johnston ("3rd Rock from the Sun"), and the rookie Haley Bennett (in her first of, I hope, many films) are monstrously funny, adding their own particular quirky comedy to this production.
Don't miss your chance to see this movie. Twice even. And the bonus features on the DVD are a real treat: the Gag Reel (bloopers), Deleted Scenes, and The Making Of featurette. If you were born between 1965 and 1975 you must see this film. To everyone else, yes, I think you'll enjoy it too. Keep in mind that all this stuff was REAL.