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Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story (2007)

Director: Jake Kasdan

Time Out rating

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12 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

James Mangold’s 2005 Johnny Cash biopic ‘Walk the Line’ receives a thorough horsewhipping from Judd Apatow and his cadre of comedic gold diggers in ‘Walk Hard’, an amiable, if unabashedly scattershot, musical parody in which every gag that is funny is matched by another that is tiresome and vulgar.

Dewey Cox (John C Reilly, pictured right) is the country singing prodigy who, having accidentally sliced his older brother in half with a machete as a child, is desperately seeking reconciliation with his hateful father. Covering Dewey’s myriad artistic reinventions and subsequent lapses into drugs, adultery and light entertainment, the film’s relative strengths and weaknesses are captured in a scene in which, seeking spiritual guidance, he heads to India and bumps into The Beatles. Their ridiculous facial hair, ludicrous accents and internal bickering are funny for about 30 seconds but director Jake Kasdan has no idea when to shout ‘Cut!’.

Similarly, as he has proved in other supporting roles, a little Reilly goes a long way, and 96 minutes in his childlike, discombobulated presence isn’t the joyful experience that many would perhaps expect. He’s suitably daft in the title role but his performance suffers from being almost identical in tone and nuance to that of his ‘Talladega Nights’ cohort, Will Ferrell; there’s even a scene where he lollops down a street in a pair of oversized Y-fronts, wigged out on acid (the Ferrell trademark).

The one area where ‘Walk Hard’ does manage to hold its own against classics of the genre such as ‘This is Spinal Tap’ or ‘Sweet and Lowdown’ is the music, all of which is expertly written and performed and comes as sweet relief from the bawdy depths that the remainder of the film frequently chooses to plumb.

Author: David Jenkins

Time Out London Issue 1952 - January 14th 2008

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User reviews of this film

Gort said...

Posted on Aug 24 2010 10:37 This movie was like a gift from god or something. I mean I was violated by that movie "Walk the line" that I wanted to take out my brain and scrape off any memory of it when this movie came obviously from a person that was equally annoyed and worked as antidote.
The only thing that I would change is the last song which they could of done with autotune to parody Cher and alike.

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Dani said...

Posted on May 01 2008 10:33 walk hard was funny, very funny. another good one from the makers of superbad. me and me mrs loved it ecpecialy the song WALK HARD.

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Judd said...

Posted on Apr 22 2008 22:46 Funniest DVD I've seen so far this year. Can't get enough Cox!

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Brucey said...

Posted on Jan 22 2008 13:56 Very funny, up there with the best! its not habit forming!!!! Quality line!

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Lucy said...

Posted on Jan 21 2008 16:46 Tried too hard to be funny, 100% Rubbish. I would rather watch The Mask 2!

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Phil said...

Posted on Jan 21 2008 13:38 Over Hyped - Over Rated - One to Forget !

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sharon said...

Posted on Jan 20 2008 18:03 i really needed cheering up, and this film is superb, a bit silly, but me and my husband lauged all the way through, i will definatly be watching it again. go and watch it if you want a good laugh...

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katie said...

Posted on Jan 19 2008 19:22 it was a great film but it was very wreid because the monkey sitting o the sofer and and the fat men say he would keep the mokey not the kids

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Willlamina Smith-Robinson said...

Posted on Jan 19 2008 12:03 What a blast, a must see film!! Especially the scene with the gay giraffe!

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JASON said...

Posted on Jan 19 2008 12:02 stupid, stupid, stupid

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Geri said...

Posted on Jan 18 2008 19:47 Don't listen to boring film critics. This was the funniest film I have ever seen!

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AJ said...

Posted on Jan 18 2008 11:52 It's a great film, if a little too silly and scattershot at times, but it's been a few days since i saw it first, and still looking back on it, through all the jokes, good and bad, it's the ending which is the best bit, and makes the film that much better, and sweeter too. You wish he actually was real in the end.

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