Rock is not dead!!! Thanks JB!

Rating: 9/10 (20 March 2004)

One of the surprise movies of last year in the States, finally makes its way to British shores and I have to say that the praise heaped upon it, and particularly Jack Black is more than warranted. The film is the sort of `loser learning the error of his ways and becoming a winner' type of movie we have seen many times before but not in a long time has a film with the predictable formula been as good. This film has been compared to Sister Act 2, because the subject matter is so similar. A musician poses as a teacher and teaches their class the joys of music and then takes their pupils to compete for a musical prize. While Sister Act 2 was attempting to be more meaningful and speaking more about society (while not particularly succeeding), School Of Rock is more pure entertainment and more exuberant. It in many ways inverts what Sister Act 2 did. While Whoopi Goldbergs character attempts to bring her pupils together and on the straight and narrow by making them into a choir, Jack Black leads his kids astray with rock. School Of Rock it must be said is infinitely more entertaining.

The film follows rock enthusiast Dewey, a Bum who dreams of being as big as the likes of his idols Led Zeppelin and AC/DC. He falls out with his band because he embarrasses them by taking things too far and generally not being as good as he thinks he his. When his former band are preparing to enter a battle of the bands, Dewey is attempting to form a new band because his ultimate goal is to win this battle of the bands. At the same time his flatmates girlfriend is annoyed that Dewey never pays Ned (his flatmate) any respect and owes him over 2000 dollars in back rent. Dewey now needs some cash and so needs a job. When the principal of a posh private school (Joan Cusack) calls for Ned (a temp teacher) to replace an injured teacher, Dewey pretends to be Ned and takes the job as an easy two weeks to make a lot of money. Dewey has no intention of doing any work with the pupils and is quite content to give them a two week recess. That is until he hears them in their music class and sees his opportunity to mould them into his own rock band and enter them in this battle of the bands under the pre-text that they are in a school competition. Anyway the plot is simple enough and while we know what will happen you just have to sit back and love the film.
Jack Black is a one man army here. The film entertains at the level it does for two key reasons: Jack Black and the brilliant soundtrack. Jack Black is superb. His exuberant, screeching, gyrating and facially contorting performance is non-stop entertainment. He is superb. I'm a fan of Jack Black, he is always great value and a scene stealer in his supporting parts but as yet I wasn't convinced he could lead a film. Shallow Hal he was funny but wasn't as rampart through 90 minutes and add to that a disappointing showing from the Farrelly Brothers. Here however Black takes his big step to comedy A-list. While the likes of Eddie Murphy and Steve Martin seem to be dying painfully unfunny deaths in tripe, the likes of Black, Will Ferrell, Ben Stiller, and Owen Wilson are on the rise. Ample replacements for some legends indeed. The rest of the cast are good. The kids can act and to give the film even more charm they can actually play their instruments and sing. Also Joan Cusack is always good and once again she shines too.
Finally I'll mention the soundtrack again. There wasn't a single song I didn't like. You have classic rock tunes from AC/DC, Led Zeppelin, Eric Clapton and more. There are also some great original songs too including the centre piece song School Of Rock. Jack Black also writes several of the songs and also sings on them. The best way to describe this film would be: It Rocks!! ****