You can’t crush a man’s dreams, even if they are to be the best air drummer in the world. That’s the premise in this Rocky meets Napoleon Dynamite picture written, directed and starring Ari Gold as the titular Power. He looks like a dorky Spike Jonze with a Members Only jacket and a perpetual sweatband. For some inexplicable reason they refuse to begin the film’s title with some sort of definite article. I assume they were going for a play-on-words, but that feels a little high-minded for this film. This movie is so chock full of quirk that none of the characters are even remotely believable. It’s geared towards the youth – kids and teens who thought the aforementioned Dynamite was hilarious and quoted it incessantly. Plus it is a very clean film. The raciest thing in the entire film is the back of a topless woman and I don’t remember any swearing at all so parents can feel good about leaving their children to see this while they catch something a little more mature. Most people out of High School will have a couple of chuckles and that’s it. However, those younger or with a younger sensibility will find lots here to giggle about and new lines to quote incessantly.
Power grows up in the small mining town of Lode, New Mexico. He lives in the basement of the house of his aunt, Joanie (Jane Lynch), although his father Harlan (Michael McKean) works in the same copper factory that he does. Power gets fired from his job at the same time that his father starts a walk out for more pay, or better benefits, or something. Power tries to join the picket lines but his father sends him away having to remind Power that he’s been fired and no longer has a stake in what happens at the plant. There’s something wrong with Power. He’s a little mentally slow, and not in a cute Forrest Gump kind of way. More in a he-shouldn’t-be-walking-around-without-a-helmet-on kind of way. I don’t particularly like this tactic of garnering sympathy for the hero of the film just because he’s an idiot and doesn’t know any better. It feels weak and a bit exploitive, but I may just be too sensitive.
Regardless, Power gets around. In fact his air drumming dream takes him to Mexico where he stumbles across an underground illegal air drum competition (where the losers get mauled by chihuahuas and chickens) then to Newark to practice with the best air drummer in the world, Carlos (Steven Williams). Carlos used to really play the drums but he is now a double amputee. Funny!! The story is common “underdog makes good” and there is nothing terribly superb from the actors (Lynch and McKean are both desperately underused) except for Shoshannah Stern. She plays Annie, a deaf girl (she lost her hearing at a Styx concert) in Newark that Power falls in love with. Her charisma and backbone made up what Power had been lacking the entire movie. Scenes where he is “showing” her the music he’s listening to were actually touching and I thought it a brilliant idea.
Power’s adversary is Dallas Houston, played with smarmy aplomb by Entourage’s Adrian Grenier. He is a country/rap/rock artist who’s selling millions of records but really, deep down in his heart, only wants to be an air drummer. Dallas’s father, Dick Houston (Richard Fancy), coincidently, owns the copper factory Power’s father is picketing. See how this sets up an ending where Dallas and Power face off AND their fathers face off? There is a large Newark air drummer competition (that is televised, by the way, so the people back in Lode can watch and cheer Power on) where air drummers from around the country congregate to see who the best air drummer is. Can I say air drummer any more often?
In the end, the film will work for children, for teenagers, for adults who think like teenagers or children. It will inspire people to see that all you need is some air drums to sound your own beat upon. I can see kids putting on sweatbands and holding air drum competitions in their back yards while blasting Genesis or Rush. For anyone looking for something with more substance than air, look elsewhere.
