TLDR: Studio 666 (2022)
Plot: Legendary rock band Foo Fighters move into an Encino mansion steeped in grisly rock and roll history to record their much anticipated 10th album. Once in the house, Dave Grohl finds himself grappling with supernatural forces that threaten both the completion of the album and the lives of the band.
Performances: The Foo Fighters aren’t actors and never cared to be. That’s a part of the movie’s charm. Rock bands don’t make movies anymore, but they should. The Beatles, KISS, more recently Tenacious D — those movies are awesome.
Direction: Horror director B.J. McDonnell gets the job done. The auteur work that is happening here has nothing to do with him, (this is clearly frontman Dave Grohl’s baby) but he puts together a flick that delivers on Grohl’s insanity.
Screenplay: Not all of the jokes land, the climax drags, the dialogue is written to be nothing but easily memorized — but this movie was never going to be perfect. Screenwriters Jeff Buhler and Rebecca Hughes are in service of Grohl’s vision and they made it happen.
Best moment: Lionel Ritchie.
Fun fact: Horror legend John Carpenter co-composed the theme to the movie and even has a quick cameo appearance.
Imaginary accolade: Cringiest Talk Show Appearance To Promote a Movie in 2022 So Far
Everything is too long. Is it too long? Yes! Movies like this should flirt with 90 minutes. This clocks in at an hour-48 minutes and you can feel that extra 15 minutes at the end. It felt like they didn’t know how to end it and that brought it down for me.
See it in cinemas or wait for streaming: I’m always an advocate for seeing horror movies with a crowd, but you may have missed the boat on that if you didn’t catch it in the opening weekend. Maybe it’ll be a good at home, with drunk friends movie.
Rating: Three-and-a-half raccoons out of five.
Credit: Plot synopsis from Letterboxd via TMDb.
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