Terror en el Estudio 666

I found out this morning that Taylor Hawkins passed away yesterday, the same day that I watched this film, so I wanted to open this review with a quick "rest in peace". I'm not sure how to segue from that, so I suppose I'll just start a new paragraph.

The greatest strength of 'Studio 666 (2022)' is arguably also its greatest weakness: the Foo Fighters and their wonderfully wonky acting. If there's any joy to be found here, it's purely because of the focal band and how much fun each member seems to be having. In fact, their energy is actually rather infectious and it makes for a rather sweet retrospective experience. In the moment, though, the movie isn't anywhere near as fun as it ought to be. It's goofy, gory and suitably self-aware, but it's also tonally inconsistent and far too long (it has about three different endings and ultimately settles on what's easily the worst one). It isn't particularly funny and it isn't particularly scary, either. It's a bit of a slog, to be honest. Pat Smear's almost permanent grin sort of encapsulates the picture's primary problem: it's always just one small step away from feeling fully credible. Every time it almost convinces you that it's a 'real' movie and you start to feel yourself getting lost in its B-movie pastiche, an unintentionally hokey or otherwise uncanny element will rear its head and set things right back to square one. Despite all this, it's never offensively bad. It's actually oddly endearing, even though it's undeniably subpar. It's never boring and its practical effects are surprisingly excellent. It has a couple of enjoyable moments, too. It's good enough for what it is, but not much more. 5/10.

I don't know if some misguided people were expecting to walk in to a polished, Hollywood big budget masterpiece, but that was certainly never the MO here. The trailers showed us that.

The acting sometimes verges on cringe-makingly awful, but the kills, thrills and gore are plentiful and, overall, the film is fun, even if it does sometimes meander aimlessly. You can tell they had fun making this.

Our beloved Foos do well with what they're given, but in terms of script, even if they're not given an awful lot, their sense of fun prevails.

Once again we come to a movie where I'm uncertain if 2 or 15 stars is what I'd give it, so I'll settle on 7, this despite the fact that stars don't really matter with something like... this. I mean, what other film in the year of our lord two thousand twenty two will you see former Germs guitarist (and touring guitar for Nirvana as my wife pointed out) Pat Smear screaming his head off as CGI demons try to rip his head off? This is maybe the most baffling comedy-horror film I've seen in a theater since Tusk - and that isn't a put down, persay, it's just... what is this?! And why is Pat Smear sometimes not good at all and other times is very funny?

Studio 666 is written like it was by 14 year olds who just discovered heavy metal and/or the Evil Dead from their older brother's cabinet, while still coming from seasoned veterans (the director of Hatchet III no less), and who cares if like 3/4ths of the Foo Fighters aren't from the Stella Adler school? It hasn't stopped rock stars from appearing in stuff and for material like a story where a band has to record an album in a house that is a portal to hell they can meet the bare minimum.

You know as soon as you see the trailer if you'll go see it, in a theater, as I did with Scream 5 and had no idea it was coming and once I saw it my thought was "HELLS YEAH... HUH... SURE! Wait is that Lionel Richie? Yes!" It's bloody, dorky, chunky, stupid, awkward, puzzling, as funny as it sometimes is pretty unfunny (some of the timing of the sorta jokes fall flat), and if I were stoned I might put a monument to it in its honor.

I gotta get an Oral History of how this came to be some day soon. Other highlights: Will Forte's wig, John Capenter (who scored the opening with his son) appearing for a cameo and probably being paid with the whiskey he drank on set, and how hard it goes in act three. I haven't listened to Foo Fighters regularly since before I had my undergrad degree, and it made me semi curious.... nah, this movie is enough. One real downside: it's a little too long.

Lots of laughs, lots of gore, lots of bad acting, bad editing and direction, but, despite all this, I had a lot of fun watching it.

Grohl is pretty good, the rest of the band, not so much.

To be picky, in a movie that is not meant to be taken too seriously, it is a bit too long and that is not how you wire a car, Pat!!

Came into it expecting exactly what it was - a goofy B-movie with plenty of comical gore, horror tropes, and amusing jokes made at the expense of each band mate. I got all of these, however these moments were far too sporadically spaced throughout the movie, with idle chit-chatting that took the plot nowhere and scenes of the band rehearsing and chilling out, eating etc that were much too leisurely employed and dragged out for what felt like eternities at times.

It's a shame because there were enough quality moments in this to make it a great 70-80 minute movie, but space these out over the course of nearly 2 hours and it's a totally different prospect. The latter part of the film contained at least 3 places where the movie could have ended satisfactorily, only for another rather pointless event or 'twist' to take place to stretch it out another ten minutes.

Overall a slightly missed opportunity, as with tighter editing it could have been a cult classic.