Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping

The big question heading into "Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping" was whether The Lonely Island trio of Andy Samberg, Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer could make their brand of pop music humor work in a format that lasts longer than three minutes. Not surprisingly, it's in different three-minute clips that "Popstar" works best.

"Popstar" is a music mockumentary following a pretty standard faux biography structure: Conner4Real (Samberg) is a huge star who made it on his own after many of years of success as a member of the Nasty Boyz, a trio with his childhood best friends, Owen (Taccone) and Lawrence (Schaffer). The story predictably follows his rise and fall, narrating it with a host of cameos from actual music celebrities playing themselves as well as supporting characters.

Conner is an over-the-top caricature of the dumbest celebrity you can imagine, and Lonely Island makes sure that there's no element of his music or rise to fame that you take seriously. Ripping into pop music culture, however, isn't the movie's focus. It's a film about a music group because its creators' gimmick is musical comedy. The goal, presumably, was to create outrageous characters and scenarios, not create stinging satire.

"Popstar" opts for the machine gun style of comedy, unloading jokes in rapid succession knowing that if at least a majority of them stick, they've done their job. Ostensibly, that strategy works. A number of gags land and feel like rather original jokes, too. From a wolf attack to a wardrobe malfunction to an argument in a limo that's besieged by naked body parts, the sequences constructed with the intention of being funny often are, it's the wedged-in jokes that aren't centerpieces that fall flat.

Surprisingly, the comedy songs used in this movie aren't the highlights. Conner's single about equality in which the lyrics are all about how he's not gay even though he's singing about LGBTQ rights is pretty standard for Lonely Island. Fans of their music will be pleased, but the comedy really comes from the joke-writing and the occasional quick-witted dialogue exchanges.

Nothing about the plot is surprising or particularly clever, however, and knowing exactly what direction they're going to take the story within the first 10 minutes weighs down the ceiling for what "Popstar" could be. If more jokes missed than hit, this flaw would be abundantly apparent and have caused the whole movie to collapse.

The Lonely Island brand of cleverly packaged immature humor won't be a hit with everyone, but it definitely salvages "Popstar," at least enough that I can highly recommend the clips.

~Steven C

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Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping never looked all that appealing to me, but I must say it was surprisingly better than I expected. Seeing the trailers I thought the film was another in a wave of ultra dumb comedies, but up front, it's really not. Popstar is a little formulaic, but is admittedly funny, and finds a way to even be witty. Even more impressive, although not all that surprising is that some of the songs in this movie are actually pretty catchy, albeit mock-ups.

For those who love This is Spinal Tap and other films of that nature, this film is a little derivative. That being said, it's not as if this is just a rehash of other better films, that entire genre does require modernizations every few years. Because this film is spoofing not only the musicians of today, but everybody in the entertainment world. That being said this film does list as another Judd Apatow film and does have some formulaic moments that appear in all of his films.

The most notable "Appatowism" in this film is the overdone comedy trope of today, where the film lingers on jokes far longer than they should, under the illusion that lingering over a joke makes it funnier. It's kinda like when a goofy kid makes a great joke everybody laughs, and then the kid gets confident and keeps pushing the joke until everybody around is just wishing he'd shut up and go away. That being said, the film doesn't live off the annoying lingering joke, and succeeds at being genuinely funny, all the time. It's not the funniest movie this year, and it may not even be hilarious, but the film is consistently littered with raunchy funny jokes, that often deliver.

The film was marketed poorly, in my opinion, because it came across as an ultra dumb comedy, and in reality isn't half as dumb as it comes across as. The film occasionally wanders into the dumb comedy area, but often finds it's way back into the land of witty comedies, making it somewhat of a mixed bag. For instance, the songs are catchy, they are witty reflections of our pop stars, but they are also a little too on the nose, making them come across as a little dumb. That being said, underneath the thin exterior of a dumb comedy is a really witty reflection of our current music industry, and the pressures, idiocracy, immaturity, selfishness, and chaos commonly associated with it.

Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping is filled with cameos from famous musicians and comedy actors, some of which even lend their singing talents to the musical pieces. At times it feels like the entire music industry is in this film, as they play along on a mockumentary making fun of them. However, the film is never really mean spirited, or all that damning it just grooves along, spoofing everybody from the musicians to the fans. For those who like the lonely island, you'll love this movie, and for those who are seeking a funny comedy, regardless of rating this is also a movie you'll love, but there should be a note, this movie really isn't for kids or the weak spined.

Look, I love Andy Samberg. But, his comedy just didn't carry the movie far enough for it to be good. But, I will say this movie is good to just watch with friends and not pay much attention to. But sitting down to watch it is just eh.

Ridiculously underrated. Despite not doing good box office numbers, it remains a hilarious movie

The excessive world of modern pop is so soulless and pretentious, it's ripe picking for drama. The mental breakings of stars like Mariah Carey, Britney Spears, Michael Jackson and others show an inherent flaw in how human beings are turned into oblivious money-making commodities, and then unceremoniously spit-out when their glimmer dies. Popstar, the brain child of the YouTube-turned-SNL stars The Lonely Island, touches on these things enough, but mostly it's just fantastic jokes. A timely and lightning-fast musical mockumentary, I could barely catch my breath from laughing. The story works as a parallel to the careers of the three Lonely Island guys themselves. Conner4Real (Samberg) is an international popstar who has grown beyond the popularity of his two Style Boyz partners (Taccone, Schaffer). While it uses that parallel effectively, it never becomes overbearing. Instead what shines are the original songs, a staple of these guys past endeavors, including their groundbreaking "SNL Digital Shorts" segments. Each one is an instant classic (i.e. "I'm So Humble", "Things in My Jeep"), played ridiculously as if they have influenced real musicians, many of whom make hilarious cameos. For those of you old enough to remember the comedy classic "Spinal Tap", this format may seem somewhat familiar. However, a distractingly blatant rip-off this is not. It uses its 30-year separation as a way to point out the modern massive difference between actual artistic influence and silly cultural nostalgia that permeates the musical landscape. And while it doesn't quite reach Spinal-Tap-heights of greatness, if you're looking for a perfect friends-night-out, this is a comedy you will be happy to visit and revisit over and again.