A total blast!

Rating: Null/10 (21 July 2004)

What looks like a potentially horrible comedy actually is quite a funny and clever excursion into music comedy, even with the often hard-to-take Jack Black in the lead.
Black of course plays a fake sub teacher at a sophisticated elementary school where he manages to teach the kids all about rock and roll, and uses them to form a band to compete with in a local battle of the bands. He even shows film clips (notably Keith Moon) and shows still pics (notably The Ramones), and teaches the kids attitude, stance and "sticking it to the man."
Of course this is all very much completely unbelievable but it is a film and a comedy, so suspending belief for a while definitely helps. It's a little odd seeing 10 year-olds sing AC/DC at the end and wear a Ramones shirt for instance, but it's all good. The Ramones even get a song in the film, so you can't beat that.
Black is really funny especially when he spurts out cliches left and right like "let's rock" and such, even making the kids pray "to the God of Rock." One odd thing is that while many classic rock bands are mentioned and/or acknowledged (The Who, The Ramones, Sex Pistols, AC/Dc, Led Zep, etc) there is no mention of either The Beatles or KISS. But someone is on the ball seeing "Buzzcocks" on the "punk" list on the blackboard.
Definitely a fun comedy and probably the only movie I have ever seen Jack Black in that I didn't get tired of him really fast. Not that he's not good in general, he is, but he is definitely not for everyone, myself very much included. But he's really good in this though. And if you like the "librarian" type of woman, as I certainly do, the school principal was very hot.