YMMV / Walk Hard

• Awesome Music: Not only does every song on the soundtrack sound like a likely hit song from its respective era in which it was supposedly written, you're very likely to keep humming various motifs for days after you've watched the movie.
• Better on DVD: There's little argument that American Cox: The Unbearably Long, Self-Indulgent Director's Cut is the superior version of the film, giving most of the jokes more breathing room and setup. That said, the filmmakers argue that its biggest drawback is how it makes Dewey out to be more of a jerkass than a well-meaning idiot than they would have liked.
• Critical Dissonance: The film carries a 74% "Fresh" rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes, while the User Score is significantly lower, at 57%.
• Cult Classic: While the film underperformed, it was an Acclaimed Flop that's managed to linger in the public consciousness with a small but dedicated fanbase.
• Genius Bonus: The movie has a ton of in-jokes and stylings covering the history of rock and roll - for instance, Ringo Starr's suggestion for a song "about an octopus" is waved off by his bandmates; "Octopus's Garden" was one of only two Beatles songs where Ringo received sole writing credit. The more you know about the genres and musicians the film covers, the funnier it is.
• Heartwarming Moments: Dewey reconnecting with his many, many children after his Creator Breakdown and getting his life back on track as a result. While the obscene number of children is played for absurdity, their actual bonding is played as genuinely sweet. Part of the montage is even scored to a lovely cover of "Come On Get Happy."
• Memetic Mutation: The movie parodies the tropes and cliches of music biopics so effectively that it's basically become impossible to make one nowadays without someone, somewhere, pointing out that Walk Hard has already made fun of it, with a handy quote at the ready to prove it.
• Moment of Awesome: Parodied. Despite Dewey's amazing life and countless hit songs, his life only comes together when he writes his ultimate masterpiece and plays it at his lifetime achievement award ceremony. He dies three minutes after he's done.
• Narm Charm: Dewey's country western cover of "That's Amoré!" is clearly meant to sound cheesy and annoying. It's arguably kind of cute.
• One-Scene Wonder:
  • Jack White as a crazy Elvis Presley yelling about karate.
  • Paul Rudd, Jack Black, Justin Long and Jason Schwartzman as bickering John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr.
• Questionable Casting: The choices to portray musicians, for the purposes of comedy. Weirdly, all the choices somehow make sense when viewed through the twisted logic of the film.
• So Bad, It's Good: Dewey's rendition of "That's Amore".
• Special Effects Failure: When Pa's upper half keels over, you can see the rim of the hole in the floor where the rest of his body is. Given the nature of the movie, plus how incredibly fake his lower half looks, this was almost certainly intentional.
• Tear Jerker: For such a goofy movie, it has some rather tender moments.
  • Dewey sings his masterpiece... then dies three minutes later. Funny as it is, the Comically Serious framing still makes it feel like we've watched the life and times of a talented, prolific artist go out on top.
  • After accidentally cutting himself in half while fighting Dewey, his dad realizes his mistake blaming Dewey for his brother's death. He tries to tell Dewey he loves him, but Dies Mid-Sentence.

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