WEIRD: THE AL YANKOVIC STORY (2022)
Tagline: The world belongs to the weird.
(Comedy, Musical, Not Quite Biography) [PG-13]
Note: This movie did not come out at the theaters, but it got a TV-14 rating, which equates roughly to a [PG-13] theatrically.
You... you think you're going to stop me from playing? You'll see. One day I'm going to be the best... Well, perhaps not technically the best, but arguably the most famous accordion player in an extremely specific genre of music!
When I first saw the previews for this moving, I was actually, and perhaps unreasonably looking for a story that actually covered the genius that is Weird Al Yankovic. I now know that expectation was probably just never in the cards. WEIRD: THE AL YANKOVIC STORY is actually a parody of not only the Weird Al Yankovic story but all music documentaries in general. While it does contain some truths, like getting his first accordion from a traveling salesman and the infamous "Yankovic Bump", 98% of this movie is “M-M-M-My bologna...”.
Where this movie succeeds is in Daniel Radcliffe’s portrayal of Weird Al himself. His performance is just mind-blowing and impressive. I guess he even learned to play the accordion a little for the part. The movie is also funny in a lot of parts and hearing a lot of the Weird Al songs in the movie brought back a lot of truly heartfelt nostalgia. I also thought Rainn Wilson (THE MEG) was very good as Dr. Demento. For me, Rainn Wilson is hit-and-miss, so I am always excited to see him kill a role.
Where this movie goes off the rails is any scene that Madonna shows up in. I thought not only was Evan Rachel Wood horrible for the part but she was given most of the worst lines in the film. Essentially the second half of this movie is so bonkers it loses its charm. The movie shifts its focus largely to Madonna and her control over Yankovich and while this is all meant to be humorous satire on the effects of drugs and music managers, it ends up just being horribly drab and it sucks the life out of this thing.
Overall the music is fantastic, and the gags are funny for the most part in the first half, but even with all of its cameos and love for the 80s and 90s, this movie is actually a rough watch. Partly because it wasn’t what I expected, but I got over that fairly quickly. What actually drags this one down is the poorly written-second half. It reminds me a LOT of UHF where we are waiting for the big gags and a lot of them just start to fall flat. The result is an almost narcissistic romp, especially knowing that Yankovick himself was involved, but I don’t want to say it was fully on purpose. After all, parody is parody.
For its really weak storyline elements, but mostly humorous first half this one is going to get a 4 out of 7 from me. It’s a little better than “JUST OKAY” given Daniel Radcliffe’s performance. I wish I liked this a lot more than I do because on paper it seemed like it had a lot of promise. Even just removing all of the Madonna parts would have bumped this up a notch.
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