Rock of Ages

Rock Of Ages is a great musical that's fun and gleefully ridiculous with an incredible cast who give good performances, especially Tom Cruise who is easily the standout. The great songs and solid pacing help make up for the predictable plot.

There was a lot of talk about this movie when it was being released about how sensational the singing was and it would be like High School Musical for adults. Well let me just say that I am not a fan for musical movies, but I give credit where credit is due and I was glad I watched this movie. The song list they had chosen to sing in this movie went along with the storyline and flowed throughout the movie. As for the singing, well it was spot on and delightful to listen to. Had me singing a lot of the songs with them. Each character was playing such a big role with the almost ensemble cast it seemed. Tom Cruise crushed it as the Rock Legend Stacee Jaxx it was very intriguing to see what his character would do throughout the movie. Julianne Hough was stunningly beautiful in every scene and her singing was nice as well, but it seemed she could use some better acting. Mary J. Blige was good in her role and really brought good quality to her character in the film that it made her star for her sort of little camera time. Overall I would recommend musical lovers and non-musical lovers to watch this for good entertainment and great music.

Can you ring my plan to watch every Tom Cruise movie in order, I come to Rock Of Ages (2012)

Plot In A Paragraph: A small town girl and a city boy meet on the Sunset Strip, while pursuing their Hollywood dreams.q

Tom Cruise steals this movie, like with Tropic Thunder, he is not the lead, but he has the best part and he seems to be having a blast.

I love rock music, especially the rock music played here, and I love musicals, some of my favourite movies are musicals, but I don't love this one. My problem with the movie cosmos down to the two leads, Diego Boneta and Julianne Hough!! They're both gorgeous, OK singers and very, so very bland.

Catherine Zeta Jones, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand and Bryan Cranston are all fun, but the movie is also plagued by predictability. Of course the 2 leads fall in love. Of course they have heartfelt conversations while standing behind the "Hollywood" sign. Of course they break up because of a misunderstanding. Of course they're back together at the end. Some parts are fun, but overall it's a miss for me!!

Rock Of Ages grossed $38 million at the domestic box office, to end the year the 84th highest grossing movie of 2012.

Came home from working (it was a long night), smoked a little weed & drank a little wine and I watched Rock Of Ages. I don't know if it was the substances I consumed or the absurdity of the musical but honestly it was kinda fun. Tom Cruise sounded a lot better than I expected and Alec Baldwin and Russell Brand... well I'll leave you to see that. Paul Giamatti was perfectly cast as a slimy agent. And Mary J Blige singing 80s rock was something I didn't know I wanted.

And the few cameos from famous 80s musicians was very cute. I never saw the stage show, so I cannot compare but overall not a bad way to spend a couple of hours unwinding after a torturous night at work.

There's a lot to love and enjoy about Rock of Ages. Like most musicals, it has a great buzz and electric feel to it. You can't help but finish this film with a big smile on your face and its a very feel good comfort experience.

The production value was also great, from the sets to the costumes, everything felt realistic and just looked cool.

Then there's the key part of any musical, the songs. You can't fault the selection, there were numerous classics which just kept on coming. Maybe a little too much.

I couldn't help but feel like there were just too many songs. There wasn't any time to take a breather and the story wasn't allowed to develop outside of the music. As a result I couldn't find myself connecting to any of the characters and I feel like there was a lot of missed opportunity to develop the plot and characters because of the amount of songs.

This wasn't the only problem with the plot... it was all over place. Was this film about Sherry, Drew, Stacee Jaxx, Patricia, Lonnie and Dennis? Who knows. There was too much sharing of the spotlight, and the constant changing of perspectives and protagonists started to give me whiplash. I think things would have benefitted from having a more obvious and clear protagonist to root for and follow, which would have given the film more drive and direction.

I also had mixed feeling about the characters. What Russell Brand was doing with his sporadic Brummie accent I'll never know. He's never been a great actor, and the accent just made everything so much worse. The two "main" characters of Sherrie and Drew were also pretty bland and I wasn't that fussed about them. Tom Cruise on the other hand, what a surprise. Easily the best thing about this film. He threw himself into this role and it massively paid off. It's worth watching for him alone.

Finally, as much as I liked the selection of songs, the singing wasn't always on point and was quite obviously auto tuned to a heavy extent for some of them. I think musical films need to start finding a better balance between casting big names to get bums on seats, but also casting actors who can sing.

Rock of Ages is definitely fun, and any musical lover will find lots to enjoy here. I did however find it to be quite messy and overcrowded with one dimensional characters and too many songs. Lots of fun, but not a great film.