By Josh Moss
josh@louisville.com
Move aside, Will Ferrell. Looks like John C. Reilly’s egocentric buffoonery — which, we admit, is a comedy style you helped mainstream — is
entertaining enough to carry an entire movie.
Reilly is the titular musician in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, which opens Dec. 21. It loosely parodies Walk the Line —the 2005 biopic that chronicled Johnny Cash’s life — and though the two movies begin the same way, with the main character contemplating his entire life before he can take the stage, Walk Hard establishes its own tone early on. “Guys,” a stagehand laments as Dewey thinks, “I need Cox!”
Flashback to the late 1940s, in Springberry, Ala., and a young Dewey Cox (Conner Rayburn) is “playing” with his brother Nate. A blowtorch and machetes are among their many toys. Though we won’t reveal how he does it — because that would ruin half the fun — Dewey accidentally kills his bro. “The wrong kid died,” their father (Raymond J. Barry) says over and over.
Saddened, Dewey learns to play the blues...the first time his picks up a guitar. By high school Reilly takes over acting duty, which is hilarious in itself. During a talent show, Dewey and his band (Tim Meadows steals scenes as a drug-loving drummer) play an innocent ditty titled “Take My Hand.” It prompts the gals to rip off their blouses and the guys to get into fistfights. Though some call it the “devil’s music,” Dewey is on his way to superstardom, hoping to eventually make a “masterpiece” to atone for his brother’s death.
From there, the story spans about 60 years. Dewey gets married to his high school sweetie and has boatloads of children. (“I’m probably going to miss some births,” he tells his wife.) He meets Elvis and the Beatles. He gets into drugs to the point that he considers experimenting with erectile dysfunction tablets. He has an affair with his backup singer — and his true love — Darlene (Jenna Fischer, Blades of Glory), a spoof on June Carter from Walk the Line. Then, of course, he lands in jail and rehab.
Though some of the jokes get stale too quickly and some of Reilly’s acting could be described as a little too Ferrell-esque, director Jake Kasdan — who co-wrote the script with Judd Apatow (The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up) — knows this is nothing that a little full-frontal male nudity can’t cure.
If that’s not your idea of a good time, at least the songs that Reilly sings — which cover numerous genres — are hysterical. “Walk Hard” should challenge “That’s How You Know” from Enchanted for the Oscar. And though we can’t repeat a lot of the lyrics here, a tamer example emerges when Reilly and Fischer share the stage together: “Let’s duet,” they sing, “in ways that make us feel good.”
Reilly was a good sidekick to Ferrell in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, but it’s nice to see his talents shine as a leading man. Only helping the cause are the countless number of cameos. Without spoiling too much, just know you’ll be pleased if you’re a fan of NBC’s The Office or Ghostface Killah or pretty much anything Apatow has done before. But it’s not like Reilly would have struggled flying solo. Because when Dewey Cox takes the stage, the crowd listens.
