School of Rock
Cast
Jack Black .... Dewey Finn
Joan Cusack .... Principal Rosalie Mullins
Mike White .... Ned Schneebly
Sarah Silverman .... Patty
Joey Gaydos .... Zack, the lead guitar player
Maryam Hassan .... Tomika, the shy singer
Kevin Alexander Clark .... Kevin, the drummer (as Kevin Clark)
Rebecca Brown .... Katie, the bass player
Robert Tsai .... Lawrence, the keyboard player
Caitlin Hale .... Marta, the backup singer
Aleisha Allen .... Alicia, the backup singer
Miranda Cosgrove .... Summer Hathaway, the band manager
Brian Falduto .... Billy, the band stylist
Zachary Infante .... Gordon, the special effects wiz
James Hosey .... Marco, the computer genius
Directed by
Richard Linklater
Rater #1 has description and review.
Rater #1
9/10. Down & out rock star Dewey Finn (Black) gets fired from his own band, faces a mountain of debts, and depression. So, he poses as his roommate Ned (White) as a 5th grade substitute teacher at an uptight private school where his attitude and hijinx have a powerful effect on his students. Hoping to win the prize money in a local "battle of the Bands" contest, Dewey forms a rock band with the kids in the class. Zach (Joey Gaydos) is a guitar prodigy, Freddy (Kevin Clark) beats a mean drum, Katie (Rebecca Brown)sizzles on bass and Lawrence (Robert Tsai) tickles the ivories on piano. Tomika, Aliesha and Marta (Maryam Hassan, Aleisha Allen and Caitlin Hale) belt out the songs as back-up to Dewey. Summer Hathaway (Miranda Cosgrove), the class factorum, takes control as the Band Manager. Dewey must do this in secret so that the Principal(Cusack), staff and parents know nothing of his plan. He enlists the rests of his class to pull this off (Veronica Afflerbach, Brian Falduto, Jordan-Claire Green, Cole Hawkins,James Hosey, Zachary Infante and Angelo Massagli).
Wowie...I was watching the previews for this movie a couple months back, and I was thinking to myself what a bad movie this was gonna be. I checked the paper last week, and noticed it got 3 stars. I thought to myself, maybe this will be a good movie if the paper thinks Jack Black can actually act well.
Jack Black was awesome through this film. I must say this was his best performance of his career because he always seems to be the drug addict or the homeless guy or something else in every other movie i see him in. I just was really surprised. The reason there are so many characters at the top of this page is because you can't forget any of them. Without every single character up there, you don't have a good movie. Those kids made the movie. They went from preppie elementary kids to rockin' band kids. They were great.
Whoever did the camera work here knew what they were doing. I felt as if I was alongside the band jammin away. Everything was set up the way it should it have been.
The only reason why this movie didn't get a 10/10 because sometimes it was a little slow going or a character didn't do quite what I was thinking, otherwise it woulda had a 10/10.
All in all, this was a great movie, and don't shy away from it because Jack Black is in it.
Rater #2
2/10. I think there's nothing that upsets me more than watching a classic
movie that I don't like. Although I do feel just as bad after seeing
a recent movie that almost everyone liked. That's how I feel about
The School of Rock. One would say that this is director Richard
Linklater's selling-out film (of course, this was before Before
Sunset), which I guess is a good film in which to sell out, because
everyone seems charmed by it. Now Linklater can get away with either
art films or Hollywood films, and we can probably expect both more
great films (like Sunset) and more crap (like School).
Dewey (Jack Black) is kicked out of a mediocre, going nowhere rock
band and hasn't paid the rent for a while. His roommate, who is a
substitute teacher, receives a call to come in, but Dewey pretends
to be him to get some money. He doesn't know what to do until he
realizes that if he enters the fourth grade class at a prep
elementary school he's teaching into a battle of the bands, he could
get some money. And if you find a way to believe that plot, then I'm
the king of Australia.
Everything in this movie makes no sense. These rich, snotty,
supposed-to-be-precocious kids (in addition to being annoying as
hell) who only care about being taught don't go tell the principal
that they're not being taught. They can play as well as a
philharmonic (they're in fourth grade), and switching instruments is
easy as pie. They want to learn in class but don't mind when their
homework is to listen to a CD. And every single student-nay, every
single character-is either a stereotype, underdeveloped, or
obnoxious. There's the prissy, stuck up leader girl in the class,
the smart yet geeky Asian, there's a homosexual student (with some
of the stupidest dialogue ever written-clich�d and stereotypical),
there's the by-the-books principal (Joan Cusack). Every kid to whom
they give names is underdeveloped, with no meaning. And Jack Black's
character is just a fat obnoxious person. There's no reason to feel
for this character. He's lazy, he's untalented, he's selfish, and an
annoying person overall. Why should we care about his stupid
misadventures in an elementary school? And wouldn't the teachers get
at least a little suspicious when not only the teacher doesn't have
ID, but the curriculum that Dewey pretends to teach varies from the
theory of relativity to the basics of Christopher Columbus? And
since when are there hard rock battle of the bands concerts at about
noon? You're probably thinking that that's just artistic license.
I'd agree with you, and I'd ignore as much of it as possible if the
movie was funny. But it wasn't.
Most of the jokes are lame and obvious. When asked what music they
like, the kids say various teen pop artists, as would be expected by
elementary schoolers. But it's stretched into this whole gag that
never works. And School of Rock's supposed to make us laugh by not
only seeing Black's Jim Carrey-esque facial expressions, but by
the "wackiness" of him playing an electric guitar in class. Raising
hell in a classroom. That's a new topic there. Later, as the whole
class goes on a field trip to register for the battle of the bands
(during school, without a chaperone, and no one wonders where they
went), everyone fits into Dewey's van, along with all of the
equipment (that completely filled his car before). Another obvious
joke is when it's said that Cusack's character gets drunk while
listening to a certain song, what do you think Dewey will do?
Seriously, this character is supposed to be likable and all, but he
just comes off as manipulative and completely phony. School's only
saving grace is me smiling a few times, but that's it. It's pretty
awful what movies will be made for a quick buck. I'd rather
Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2 do better than The School of Rock did,
just to knock this movie down a peg.
Rated PG-13 for some rude humor and drug references.
Running time: 108 minutes
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