This is Spinal Tap
Everything starts somewhere and for
mockumentaries it likely happened with “This is Spinal Tap”. I am quite certain
that the verité comedy had already been in place for some time (“Real Life”
from 1979 comes to mind), but the format of presenting a movie as a
documentary, while actually making fun of the subject is often attributed to “This
is Spinal Tap”.
We are introduced to the “filmmaker” Martin
Di Bergi (Rob Reiner himself, the actual director of this movie), who tells us
that he is a long-time fan of the band and wants to make a concert movie based
on their tour of the United States. As the filmmaker, he then proceeds by
showing up here and there in the movie, either to comment or to interfere with
the tour.
Of the band we particularly follow lead
singer David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean), guitarist Nigel Tufnel (Christopher
Guest) and bassist Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer) with keyboardist Viv Savage
(David Kaff) and drummer Mick Shrimpton (R.J. Parnell) more in the background.
The band started out as a very mellow flower-power band in the sixties, but
then turned to heavy metal or at least the glam-rock version of it, now having
the reputation of being the loudest band in Brittain (cranking volume up to
11!). It is understood that they used to be a really big name but is having
less success of late.
The American tour is supposed to be a promotion
tour of the new album “Smell the Glove”, but there are problems right from the
outset as the American record label does not want to print the cover, which is
considered sexist (which, from the description of it, is an understatement).
The manager of the band, Ian Faith (Tony Hendra), desperately trying to keep it
all together, lands a compromise with an all-black cover that satisfy no-one.
The tour is, to say the least, chaotic. Many
venues are cancelled or moved to far more humble locations. We see the band
interact, both with themselves and the press, and in both cases we get a lot of
the tropes on moronic rock musicians. There are some, but sadly few, clips of
them actually playing at concerts. Those parts are great, though, if you listen
to the lyrics. Those lyrics are simply amazing.
Midway through the tour David’s girlfriend
Jeanine (June Chadwick) shows up. She quickly sets herself up as a band member
off stage and challenges Ian to his great chagrin. Her ideas are even more
moronic than the band’s own and the whole thing explodes with both Ian and
Nigel walking out on the band.
The entire movie is a joke, of course. It
is a parody of the touring rock band, mocking all the tropes on those. The band
members are more air-headed than most, the lyrics totally out there, the attitudes
in place, and of course of money-people who are only there when things are
going well.
The interesting thing is that all this is
played for real. Everybody stays in character and take themselves seriously.
They are over the top, but nobody plays over the top. Add to this that all the
dialogue is improvised, and you get this real documentary feel to the movie. A
documentary of a crazy, but quite real world. There are times where it gets
totally absurd as with the pod on stage that does not open, trapping Derek
inside or the 18-inch version of Stonehenge on stage with dancing leprechauns.
But it is dealt with by the band as serious incidents, crazy, but real and so
it works (not to mention the Jazz-Odyssey incident).
It is this balance of keeping the craziness
real that is the key to “This is Spinal Tap”. Had this just been about making fun
of rock musicians, this would not have been half as funny. As it is, the verité
element is so well developed that we believe in the band even though they are
stupider than toothpaste. As it happens, I read that several famous musicians
are themselves fans of the movie, notably Sting, because this is the story of
their experience, and they can see the fun of it.
Although hours and hours of material was
shot, it is cooked down to only 82
minutes and I think that was a wise choice. There are simply limits to how long
you can draw out a joke. As it is, I was having a lot of fun watching this one,
but I am not certain it would have lasted another hour.
Researching this, I looked up the story of
Christopher Guest. It is quite amazing. I want to watch a movie about him, his
life and family.