Review of This Is Spinal Tap (1984) by Alexander D — 08 Jun 2012

The best part of THIS IS SPINAL TAP is the music. Listen to the instrumental music and it sounds great (with a notable exception being "Stonehenge"). The music channels that of bands such as Poison and Metallica, with rough guitar riffs and fast solos. What provides the comedic effect are the lyrics to these songs. It's like listening to Weird Al Yankovic in a hard rock group. What else provides a great comedic effect is how inept this band is. They have had a history of band members dying from very, very bizarre circumstances, such as "spontaneous human combustion" and choking on an unknown other person's vomit. But there's one scene, in particular, that defines this description of them. This scene involves the band in attempt to emerge from blue, cocoon-like enclosures, one after the other, for their stage performance. The guitarist and lead vocalist emerge successfully, and they perform the entire song without knowing that behind them, their manager is struggling to get the bassist out of his cocoon, by even trying to burn and hammer it open.

THIS IS SPINAL TAP uses a documentary-like structure to poke fun at the wild behavior of such musicians, but it is in no way a documentary. Strangely enough, it feels every bit like one, and clearly it was made to look essentially like one. The film was shot on a $2.5 million budget by Rob Reiner at initially well over five hours (before being cut down to less than eighty minutes), which often happens with many factual cinematic works. Somehow, it feels even more like a comedy, which it is, without a doubt. I wouldn't even dare to say this is a comedy meant for those who would categorize themselves in the strictly music demographic; this doesn't require a heavy musical vocabulary. Turn it up to 11; watch it.