Power Ballad
Rick (Paul Rudd) is an American living in Ireland, where he sings and plays guitar in a cover band (The Bride and Groove) that mainly plays wedding receptions. He gave up his dreams of hitting it big as a rock star years ago, when he fell in love with an Irish woman, got married, and had a daughter. He’s mostly happy with his life.
B&G is playing at a fancy wedding held in a castle, and one of the (American) groom’s best friends is a former boy-band pop star, Danny (Nick Jonas). Danny joins the group for a song, and Rick and Danny hit it off and have a great time. After the reception, Rick is strolling the castle grounds, and passes by Danny’s amazing suite. Danny invites him in to talk about music, and it turns out that Danny has been staying there awhile, working on a new album. He’s been having trouble getting away from his boy-band image, and is working on some songs. Rick comes up with some good ideas for a song Danny is working on, and then Rick shares an unfinished song he’s been working on for the last decade plus, but he can’t quite get the bridge right. They have a great time, Rick goes home to his family, Danny goes back to the US.
Six months later, Rick is buying soccer shoes for his daughter at the mall, and hears his song, the one he had been working on but never finished, played over the sound system. WHAT? He thought Danny was such a genuine, nice guy, but he ripped him off? Suddenly the song has become a come back hit for Danny, and Rick is seething. But no one remembers him working on this song..not his wife and daughter, not his band mates, no one. Rick starts to lose his shit, thinking of the road not travelled, of how getting a partial writing credit on this song could be life changing for him, of what it means to be an artist who creates, not just a member of a cover band.
Ted and I saw Power Ballad on Saturday, and we both really enjoyed it. Both Rudd and Jonas were great, and it was a fun way to spend an afternoon. Ted wrote a more in depth review for Popdose, here!
12 Comments
Margaret
Paul Rudd is easy on the eyes! 🙂 John and I have seen many music themed films and they’ve all been good.
J
I think you would like this one then!
Kel me about it
I was listening to an interview with Nick Jonas on the Smartless podcast, and he seemed great! It got me really intrigued about this film, so it’s good to know it’s great! Can’t go wrong with a Paul Rudd film either.
J
Welcome Kel! I hope you enjoy the film if you get a chance to see it.
Michelle G.
This one sounds good! Finally, a movie that sounds good to me!
J
LOL, I feel that way sometimes too!
Tamara
Ooh thanks for the write up. I loved the director’s movie Once and really want to see this. I saw the trailer but didn’t get that Rudd’s character is an international transplant. Interesting.
J
I haven’t seen any of the director’s other work, but now I want to. There is one available for free on Apple TV, and others we can rent I think. I’m going to check them out.
ernie
Oh, I love Paul Rudd. I also love Ireland. I’d not heard of this movie. I do remeber seeing a clip of him in a bar in Ireland during filming, but knew nothing about the movie. I look forward to seeing this.
J
I hope you enjoy it, we really did.
StephLove
I will keep this in mind the next time we’re making a movie pool for family movie night. (We pick 6-8 at a time so we can avoid the torturous “what should we watch” discussion.)
J
We saw this one in the theater, so it may be a few minutes before it’s streaming. Unless you’re talking about going to the movies. In the shorter term, you could look up the director, John Carney, and see his other movies, they are supposed to be lovely.