 Roadie (1980) I like music. I like movies. Shouldn't I like Roadie? Who the fuck knows. This movie was entirely incomprehensible to me, seeming much more like the work of a cocaine-fueled weekend than a well-thought-out Hollywood project. As much as I tend to object to formulaic screenwriting, I find that I do appreciate it when there's at least a script. Meat Loaf stars as Travis W. Redfish, a Texan hick doofus who is something of a cross between Sloth from The Goonies and MacGyver. He's able to fix anything, usually with bobby pins and/or potatoes, and he's prone to "brain lock," a confusing situation wherein he begins free-associating random "philosphical" questions and statements. Both major plot points of the film center around him having brain lock, which mainly entails him staring confusedly while everyone else's speech echoes around him, until he can drink enough beer to quell the spell. Kaki Hunter is Lola, his love interest, a 16-year-old virgin who is saving herself for Alice Cooper and who wants to become "the greatest groupie who ever lived." Travis leaves his weird trailer-trash home (filled with innumerable useless gadgets and a very unpleasant, yet somehow comforting Art Carney) for a life on the road as the "world's greatest roadie." Yuh? The film tries hard to make the point that groupies and roadies are what put the "roll" in "rock 'n' roll," but I was mostly reminded of the "Mr. Show" sketch about a supposed 1976 Saturday Night Fever-esque fad movie about streaking (Bare Ambition). The plot offers opportunity for musician cameos a'plenty, although the director can't seem to decide whether to aim for a new wave hipster audience or a redneck country audience, so he throws giant whipped-cream pies at both. Hence, Cooper and Blondie rub shoulders with Hank Williams, Jr., Roy Orbison, and Asleep at the Wheel. Now that's box office gold! As a side note: 1980 Roy Orbison is not pretty. The movie is mostly a rambling, befuddling mess, with "joke" after "joke" that probably made sense at the time (and well under the influence). It picks up steam in the last third, with Alice Cooper proving quite funny and Debbie Harry adding some hip hilarity to the mix. Meat Loaf and Hunter are both reasonably good, though their characters are so weird I was left simply trying to stop my jaw from dropping in astonishment that this film was thought to be entertaining on some level, much less at all funny. Don Cornelius is great as a no-bullshit concert promoter, but when Don Cornelius is the most coherent aspect of your film, you need to do some rethinking. Roadie seems to aim for some kind of Blues Brothers magic (if that film can be said to have any "magic"), but is appreciable primarily as a time capsule of 1980, especially if you like any of the bands involved. Even if that's the case, though, it's one hell of a strange ride.
Review by Ms. Magazzini |
