A little of this, a little of that -- no, none of that!

Rating: 4/10 (29 August 2008)

Once does earn props for the fact that it reinvents the musical -- in multiple ways. The first is that it makes the music part of the story rather than a fantasy, and still achieves the same result as an ordinary musical might; the second is that it is the first indie-musical to get attention, made on a budget that on most films would be pocket change.
But let's be honest. The music sucks. I love folk music, I love good soft rock, I love confessional songwriting -- heh, I write music criticism, too. But the best of those genres are very safe from the tunes offered here, which are never horrible but frequently manage to be unmemorable.
Once is interesting, but it fails miserably in what it tries to do. What it gets credit for is innovation -- but that's like inventing a brighter light bulb that just happens to burn out after twenty minutes.