Incredible, funniest movie I have ever seen.

Rating: Null/10 (22 August 2002)

From the beginning to the end, this movie is brilliantly constructed. The start in medias res of the group's waning popularity, the internal struggle which almost destroys them, and their reunion and ascent back into popularity are crafted to perfection. Good things do happen to good people, and the band members remain so obliviously optimistic in the face of inevitable failure throughout that we cannot help but love them.
In this film, ALL questions are answered: the band manager, who slaves away for Spinal Tap, is finally appreciated and respected; David and Nigel's friendship prevails over Janine, the would-be destroyer of the group; and Derek, too easy-going to worry or complain, remains "somewhere in the middle [of Fire and Ice], sort of like lukewarm water." The mocumentary reveals the true souls of the musicians through ballads like "Lick my Love Pump" and lyrics like "my baby fits me like a skin tuxedo, I love to sink her with my pink torpedo" and "big bottom, talk about mud-flaps, my girls got 'em". Even social issues such as drugs ("well I'm sure I'd be more upset right now if I wasn't so heavily sedated"), racism ("Well, we don't literally say 'love your brother'; we don't even literally mean it. But we're anything but racist") and sexism ("well it is and it isn't; she should be made to smell the glove, just... you know... not repeatedly") are tackled and resolved.
"The dials go up to 11" in this flick, where "you can't dust for vomit" and freak gardening accidents are "best left unsolved". Films like "Rock Star" will never achieve this level of wit or popularity; what Stephen Herek and John Stockwell fail to realize is that it takes more than marketing gimmicks for a film to stick - it takes intelligence, a department in which the two of them are quite evidently and quite worryingly lacking. In the end, there is a fine line between clever and stupid, and this movie is so funny that, it's like, how much funnier could a movie be, and the answer... is none.