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Hot Take: Rock the Kasbah

Hot Take: Why?

Rock the Kasbah is a disaster of a movie. There are unintentional tributes to the Bill Murray catalog throughout. It’s as if writer Mitch Glazer and director Barry Levinson met and said, “What if we took everything Bill Murray ever did and stripped away everything funny?” Even The Razor’s Edge, an earnest attempt at a dramatic role for Murray, was funnier.

Did you enjoy Murray’s witty interactions with the innkeeper in Groundhog Day? Murray getting high with the zombie survivors in Zombieland? Ending up in a foreign land and an odd befriending of a young woman in Lost in Translation? Realizing he’s wasted his life by being a dishonest asshole in Scrooged? Trying to talk his way out of a gun fight in Stripes? Singing in St. Vincent? Having an odd sort of sexual encounter in Ghostbusters? Pulling off a con in Wild Things? There’s similar scenes in Rock the Kasbah. They’re completely void of humor but they’re there.

It takes about 50 minutes for the film to get to the heart of the story. After roughly 8 minutes in the heart of the film (a decent 8 minutes), the film skips a few beats. By the time it gets back to the most interesting (interesting is being used very loosely here) aspect of the movie, it’s pretty much over.

“Spoiler Free” Pros

  • Salima’s Singing
    Leem Lubany (the actress who played Salima) has a great voice. It feels as if the film could have centered around Salima rather than Murray’s Richie Lanz. Murray could have then been in a more effective supporting role and you’d have a slightly better bad movie.

“Spoiler Free” Cons

  • Everything Else
    If you told me you thought this was the worst movie of 2015, I wouldn’t argue. It wasn’t the worst I’ve seen but it was pretty damn close.

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Related

2015-10-27
By: Brian Joseph
On: October 27, 2015
In: 2015, Hot Take
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