From Amy Winehouse to Elvis, musical biopics are ubiquitous – but it’s only the fake ones that are really worth watching
With each passing year, it becomes harder to deny that Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story from 2007, Jake Kasdan’s cult comedy about a fictitious rocker’s rise and drug-addled fall might be the most prescient Hollywood film of the 21st century.
Borrowing liberally from the 2005 Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line the film skewers rock biopic cliches as mercilessly as Airplane! lampooned disaster movie tropes. Its hero, Dewey (John C Reilly) blames himself for his brother’s death, ascends to fame, falls for a singer who isn’t his wife, rubs shoulders with the Beatles, descends into drugs, goes to rehab, gets clean, and – by the film’s end – makes a triumphant return to the stage.
