Pop Star: Never Stop Never Stopping
Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 7:00PM 
Eric here, with a quick review of the new movie from The Lonely Island comedy trio of Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, and Jorma Taccone, Pop Star: Never Stop Never Stopping.
Pop Star is one of those films, like Anchorman or Zoolander, that gives you two choices: surrender or resist. You can either dive headfirst into this mockumentary of pop music sensation Conner4Real, and enjoy a hodgepodge of hit-or-miss jokes…or you can yawn at the filmmakers calling in a favor to every famous person they know (Carrie Underwood, Adam Levine, Usher, etc.) to lend some authenticity to the piece.
If you resist, Pop Star is probably a pretty unbearable sit, because it’s another movie from producer Judd Apatow that features a bunch of male comedy guys conning a studio out of about $30 million just so they can show the world (and themselves) how adorably imbecilic but ultimately likable they are. While the film itself is about an egomaniac, there’s a lingering ickiness about the ego behind and in front of the camera too. The film purports to skewer rap star narcissism, but the behavior is celebrated as often as it’s parodied.
But if you surrender, the laughs deliver...
Directors Schaffer and Taccone have sharp talent, and they do a credible and intelligent recreation of documentaries about musicians like last year’s Oscar winner Amy. They get the bizarrely grave tone of docs about album launches, and they indulge just enough improv from the actors to not derail the picture.
One of their smartest calls is littering the film with a combination of real musicians playing “themselves” along with key comic actors playing roles in the narrative. Sarah Silverman, Tim Meadows, Joan Cusack, and Maya Rudolph all turn up…they’re not given much to do, but it’s always nice to see them. One of the best small payoffs in the movie is Justin Timberlake, in two brief bits as Connor4Real’s personal chef…he’s both stylized and fully in character, and you wish you could see more of him.
Considering that The Lonely Island guys have made so many hilarious music videos, it’s surprisingly the music in Pop Star that falls the flattest. They score early on with a misguided “human rights” rap in favor of gay marriage where Conner4Real keeps reassuring us how straight he is. But after that, they resort to lazy profanity riffs that have little imagination, and an Osama Bin Laden song that starts out very funny but doesn’t escalate or develop as it goes along.
Andy Samberg remains a very winning comic actor, and his cheekily-titled Pop Star: Never Stop Never Stopping is crammed with jokes and confidence. I fear, though, that Apatow and The Lonely Island team think they are edgy, but their POV is a bit watered-down and limp... at least in this movie. Nothing is terrible but no observation goes beyond the facile. Their need to make sure the audience loves them is a shame, too, dulling the comic edges. They’re all naturally likable people, and none of them have to push this hard.
Reader Comments (4)
I'm not a fan of their type of comedies.
Me. I Am Mariah... The Elusive Chanteuse is the best of this movie.
Great review - my sentiments exactly. While I found myself laughing hysterically at many moments, I kept asking the same question - is this pop music satire or worship? Maybe that's the true genius of The Lonely Island, one can never be sure.
Sawyer: Their best song is probably Threw it On the Ground. "I'm an adult!" "The moral of the story is: You can't trust the system! Maaaaaaan!" "Happy birthday to the ground!"