Electric Blue

I thought this film had an original story and a great script. Michael J. Fox puts forth a wonderful attempt to make us believe he is Joe Rasnick, aspiring rock performer, and, as always his acting is on the level and heartfelt. Joan Jett, while trying really hard to play the wild and sometimes estranged sister Patti, just can't seem to find the emotion needed to make her role believable (her musical performance doesn't disappoint, though). Gena Rowlands, as usual, is superb in her attempt to make us buy her as Joan Jett's righteous and disapproving mother. All in all entertaining, yet not quite believable.

Joe (Michael J. Fox) and Patti (Joan Jetti) play in the band `The Barbusters'. They use to play in bars in the suburbs. Patti is the singer of the band and a single mother, has a beautiful son and is very rejected by her mother Jeanette (Gena Rowlands). They do not accept and understand each other. The father of Patti's son is unknown by her family. Patti wants to follow the career of musician, but her brother uses the band indeed as an alternative for the lack of job. Joe is the link between Patti and Jeanette, trying to resolve and absorb their problems. A terminal cancer in Jeanette changes the relationship among the family and cruel revelations are presented in the end, with a final redemption of the characters. The melodramatic screenplay of this movie looks like a Mexican soap opera, but the soundtrack is great. There is a minor participation of Jimmie Vaughn, as the singer of another band (`The Fabulous Thunderbirds'). This movie is not a masterpiece, but entertains, especially if the viewer watches it without any expectation, just for killing time. My vote is five.

I wouldn't go as far as to say this is the greatest rock n roll movie Ever, but I think this is the greatest bar band movie EVER! I grew up around Cleveland about this time, and this is how it was! My brothers are muscicians, and this was THEIR story! Back then, not many movies were filmed in Cleveland because of how it looked. It was sooooo refreshing to see a movie that not only showed how Cleveland looked, but how the people that lived there REALLY were! Joe( Michael J. Fox) reminds me so much of my brother it's scary! And Patti ( Joan Jett) was who I wanted to be!! Not to mention the music ROCKS!! I have been to the Euclid Tavern ( I think it's closed now) and the Akron Agaora (I know that's closed) and that's how they really were! Kudos to Paul Schrader for making this movie! BTW........CLEVELAND ROCKS!!!!! (Did I mention that Michael J. Fox is my favorite actor? GET BETTER MICHAEL!!!!!!!)

Back when I was 21, I went with a few friends to see another film (I forget which, now) that had sold out, leaving us with this film as an option that we took.

I was so pleasantly surprised that a film I would otherwise never have bothered with turned out to be so resonant with me.

I expected a teenybopper rock'n'roll picture. This film is nothing close to that. This is a gritty, hard-edged slice of life. It is full of realistic human emotion and genuine observation of actual "rock'n'roll" lifestyle, which for the vast majority of rockers means nightly sharing of a van and a motel room and splitting up a few hundred bucks five or six ways before expenses. The scene in "Motel Hell" where Fox doles out the money (after enumerating the expenses including "forty-five dollars for that tire, and eighteen for the Chinese feast") just struck such a ringingly true chord with me.

The secondary drama, which plays out as you understand that the primary drama (will the band make it?) is already moot (Fox knows that the Barbusters have no chance; Jett continues to chase the dream regardless) commences with the discovery of their mother's illness.

The interplay between Jett and her mother in the hospital as the mother lays dying and they reconcile their long-hardened differences is surprisingly well-played, especially on Joan Jett's part. I expected great acting from the superb Gena Rowlands; I expected zero from Jett and was blown away instead. I'm surprised she never got any other real roles; I found her to be extremely easy on the eyes and quite a lovely and talented actress. Whatever.

The film has a terrific ending. No, they don't make it to the big-time, but you never expect that to happen anyway. It is simply a satisfying ending that matches the size and scope of this terrific film, which was never intended to be anything more than a look at a Cleveland family who has two members who happen to play in a road band.

Catch it once in your lifetime.

This film may not be a work of genius, but it touched me deeply in 1987 and it still does. Joan Jett and Michael J. Fox touch a chord literally and figuratively as polar opposite siblings who share a passion for music. Gena Rowlands is absolutely brilliant as the desperately ill mother who clings to her faith for solace and dominates her children out of fear for them. The soundtrack is jam-packed with old-fashioned style rock n' roll. An instrumental piece (titled Elegy) underscores the leaden sadness throughout the film and is ethereal and beautiful. For anyone who has struggled with family strife, there will be familiar territory here. This film is, in my opinion, underrated and worth a second (or a first!) look.