Song Sung Blue Review
A couple days back I was able to see Song Sung Blue at Cinemark’s Secret Screening. This is one that was on my radar going back to July when I saw Hugh Jackman’s one man show at Radio City Music Hall in New York City where he talked to us about the movie and getting the word out there, followed by us sining Sweet Caroline. I was very excited to check this movie out. What did I think about it? Let’s get started!
The Review
I’ll just right off the bat, Song Sung Blue is good but not as good as I’d hoped. Maybe some of that was due to personal bias that I got to see Hugh Jackman within the calendar year. I feel like the movie has a lot of the same issues that The Smashing Machine had. But I do think Song Sung Blue is a better movie. This movie stars Hugh Jackman and Kate Hudson as this married couple and Jackman plays this Neil Diamond interpreter and you follow their journey throughout the rise and fall of their music career. It’s an interesting movie because the trailers give off one vibe about the movie and the movie itself is actually something very different. The trailers present the movie as this uplifting story about this married couple and their love for Neil Diamond. In a sense, that’s what the movie is about. You see how this couple met and their journey throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s but the movie is much darker and more emotional then the trailers let on. If you’re interested in this movie I would be aware that the movie isn’t what you expect it to be based on the trailers. The movie itself takes some pretty big tone shifts that’s very jarring. The movie sets up certain expectations of what the movie is about, the tone and vibe of it. For the first 30-40 minutes of the movie, you’re thinking to yourself “this is a great inspiring movie to see around Christmas”, and then something happens and the movie gets very dark and heavy. Every 20-30 minutes after that there’s another “oh wow” moment that my entire theater is in shock of what’s happening.
I think the main reason why this film’s issues reminded me of The Smashing Machine was that it was trying to do too much in too little time. Where there’s the main dynamic between Jackman and Hudson and following their family throughout the decades. But every character has like two or three sub-plots that are kind of connected to the main plot but not really. Jackman’s character is a recovering alcoholic, he has heart issues, and he’s trying to connect with Hudson’s character’s kids while also doing a Neil Diamond tribute band. Hudon’s character has stuff that she’s dealing with throughout the movie. The movie doesn’t earn the moments that it’s supposed to. The moments don’t hit as hard as I think they should. I think this movie could’ve worked better as a 6 to 8 episode mini-series on HBO Max or something. You take Jackman and Hudson and have them lead a mini-series about this story you could get some very powerful and very moving. But when the movie is just over 2 hours long and trying to tackle so much of their life and them as people it means that it’s not able to give anything the proper time to breathe and have the audience set in this world with the characters. Kind of tied to that but the movie also feels way too long. The film is 2 hours and 13 minutes and I can easily imagine a version of this movie that’s 10-15 minutes shorter. I think if you cut some stuff and shorten some scenes you could trim this down. There’s this big reveal around 60% of the movie that involves Hudson’s daughter that comes out of nowhere and doesn’t add anything to the plot. I get that it happened in real life so you wanna honor the legacy of these people but in terms of the plot of the movie and what the movie is about, it doesn’t add anything. The only thing that it adds is to the runtime that EASILY could’ve and should’ve been shorter. The movie is a weird mix of being too long and too short all at the same time.
One final negative to talk about here is that the movie feels fabricated. The movie is based on a true story and after the movie was finished I Googled what I could about the movie and what actually happened and they changed a lot of the events of the movie to better fit into a movie template. Because of that, the whole movie feels fabricated and fake. There’s so much that happens to these people in a window of time in terms of personal stuff and people getting injured. The first big time it happens it doesn’t feel fake but when you keep on going and especially get to the final moments of the movie, they changed the ending to make the ending more impactful but I don’t think it benefited the movie at all. I got the sense of it feeling fabricated even before I Googled what actually happened. Something about it felt fabricated and fake and that they were making certain things happen just so it can make for a more exciting movie. Bohemian Rhapsody was criticized for this back in 2018 and I think people are going to feel a little bit of that frustration watching this movie.
I know that I’m being very negative about the movie. To be clear, I didn’t hate this movie. I thought this movie had a lot to offer. Both our lead performances with Hugh Jackman and Kate Hudson are really good. A lot of people have been and will continue to talk about Kate Hudson’s performance. She was nominated for a Golden Globe and once you see the movie you 100% understand why she got that nomination. Her character goes through the most change, what happens to her character is shocking and heartbreaking. That allows a great talent like Hudson to really shine and craft a performance that sticks with you. I hope because of the acclaim she’s getting for this movie it means that she’ll get more roles like this. More roles that let her showcase her full acting range. Maybe start a bit of a career resurgence. She was huge in the early 2000s with Almost Famous and How to Lose A Guy in 10 Days and hasn’t done many big roles in the last 15 years. If this movie is watched by enough people and people continue to praise her performance, this could act as a career resurgence for her. Of course, Jackman is an incredibly talented person that sings, he can act, and he is charming. When you watch this movie he brings all of that to the screen. He’s not as good as Hudson, he’s not deserving of awards in a way that Hudson is. There’s a few moments in which he can go too big with the acting. I think he could’ve dialed it back a bit in certain moments. He’s not bad in the movie whatsoever, but it’s a top tier performance in a way that I think it could’ve been.
One final thing to talk about here but the soundtrack for the movie is of course fantastic. One of the things I realized watching this movie was how many of Neil Diamond’s songs that I didn’t know. Of course I know “Sweet Caroline”, that’s actually my go to karaoke song. The fact that “Sweet Caroline” is his most popular song that everybody knows is built into the movie. Hugh Jackman’s character even addresses that he doesn’t just want to see “Sweet Caroline” he wants to celebrate Diamond’s whole catalog of songs instead of just the main one. When Jackman and Hudson play other Neil Diamond songs they’re very catchy and remind you that he has a lot of great songs. It helps that Jackman and Hudson are great singers and can play these songs very well.
Final Thoughts: I know I seem like I’m being very negative on the movie. The truth is, it’s much easier to express your frustration about a movie than it is to find the positives in them sometimes. Song Sung Blue is a movie that has a lot more issues that are easier to articulate than the positives. I could see this movie being polarizing with a lot of people really liking it and a lot of people being more negative on it. Right now the movie has an 81% on Rotten Tomatoes with 31 reviews counted. I wouldn’t be surprised if the release date approaches if that score drops. I think this movie is going to be in the 60%-65%. If you like Neil Diamond and biopics then I’d recommend you go see this movie. But don’t go in expecting a top tier biopic or one of the best movies of the year.
The Score: 8.0/10 (B-)
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