Being honored for his career in music, singer Dewey Cox flashes back to the events that brought him there, from accidentally killing his brother to a string of bad marriages, substance abuse and experiments with various musical styles.

CRITIQUE

Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story is a satirical movie that actually gets better with repeated viewings.  Though the first time I saw it it felt very flimsy storywise, essentially just repeating the story beats of every other biopic of this type, when one revisits it while just concentrating on the music, the laughs and the performances, there is a lot here that works pretty well.  Ultimately, this is an entertaining DVD, which is very well-packed with extras, and it is worth a look.

The film tells the fictional story of Dewey Cox, and makes fun of other films of this type, such as Ray, Walk the Line, Great Balls of Fire and The Buddy Holly Story.  So Dewey gets to deal with all the clichés of the drama (childhood angst, a first unhappy marriage, affairs and substance abuse on the road), with director Jake Kasdan (who co-wrote the script with Judd Apatow) showing a good feel for pushing things over-the-top to get laughs.  The film follows Cox’s whole career, amusingly letting him try a bevy of musical styles, as he goes through his Buddy Holly period, his Johnny Cash period, his Bob Dylan period, his Brian Wilson period and then the disco era.

Making this work is John C. Reilly, who in a rare chance to play a leading role does well at it, making Dewey likable even as he is making bad choices.  Helping a lot is the music, which is generally-dead on here; most of the invented tunes sound like they could be classics from an era, while several provide good laughs as well.

A lot of familiar faces also pop up to good effect, with Jenna Fischer (The Office) doing good work as Cox’s second wife, and comic actors from Saturday Night Live and Apatow’s other movies showing up for funny scenes or two.  A sequence with the Beatles is amusing, particularly since they are played by an unbilled Jack Black, Paul Rudd, Justin Long and Jason Schwartzman.  Ultimately, though this falls a bit short of greatness, there are a lot of inspired things here, and it’s a solid DVD to have on one’s shelf.

THE VIDEO

Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story is presented in 2.40 anamorphic widescreen, mastered in high definition.  The picture quality is solid throughout.

THE AUDIO

Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story is presented in English and French 5.1 Dolby Digital.  Dialogue, music and sound effects come through clear.  There are English, French and Spanish subtitles.

THE EXTRAS

American Cox: The Unbearably Long, Self-Indulgent Director’s Cut is two hours long, 24 minutes longer than the regular version, and it feels long.  Still, the longer length yields some more jokes, as well as a ‘70s sequence in which Dewey marries Cheryl Tiegs.

Both versions have a Commentary featuring Jake Kasdan, Judd Apatow, John C. Reilly and producer Lew Morton.  The quartet banter well with each other, and the commentary is an entertaining one.

The Making of Walk Hard is a 15-minute documentary about the film.

There are 19 minutes of Deleted and Extended Scenes, most of which is different from the material in the director’s cut.

Line-O-Rama, which has become an Apatow DVD staple, is six minutes of alternate takes in which the actors improvised lines that weren’t used.

Full Song Performances consists of 41 minutes of material, essentially the full versions of 16 songs used in the movie.

The Music of Walk Hard is a 16-minute movie about the process of having songwriters pen the songs, and then making the songs work.  John C. Reilly did all his own singing; Jenna Fischer didn’t.

Song Demos are the audio versions that the songwriters did originally, including Marshall Crenshaw’s take on the title song.

A Christmas Song From Dewey Cox is a three minute song called “For Christmas, the People Want Cox”, which wasn’t used in the movie.

Cox Sausage Commercial With Outtakes is a two-minute piece in which Dewey Cox films a sausage commercial.

Tyler Nelson: A Cockumentary is a tongue-in-cheek at the actor whose penis helped get the film an R rating.

Bull On The Loose is a 3-minute sequence about the filming of a bull scene, which almost got very dangerous.

The Real Dewey Cox is a 14-minute mockumentary in which real musicians and characters from the film talk about the real Dewey Cox.

The Last Word With John Hodgman is a 26-minute bit in which Hodgman interviews an in-character elderly Dewey Cox, who reminisces about his life.

FINAL THOUGHT

A generally-funny movie that is ultimately worth picking up.