Movie Review: ‘Power Ballad’

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Despite the frequent jokes about Paul Rudd being ageless, in Power Ballad, he plays a character that basically goes through a mid-life crisis centered around a long-dormant/practically-dead dream of being a rock star. Rudd and Nick Jonas are fantastic together in this entertaining and meaningful story about the ups and downs of the music industry and the truly important things in life. I enjoyed the movie and would highly recommend it.

Paul Rudd plays Rick Power, an American musician living in Ireland performing in a wedding band who still kind of dreams about performing in a huge arena. He gave up his rock star dreams to settle down with a woman he met while touring with his former band and the two now have a daughter and a decent (non-rich and famous) life. On the other hand, Danny Wilson (Nick Jonas) is trying, as a solo artist, to maintain the celebrity status he had as a member of a boy band… and he is not having much luck. After a chance encounter, the pair spend a night hanging out together drinking, smoking, and working on their music. When Danny returns home with his new music, none of his music really stands out until he plays one of Rick’s songs in front of his girlfriend, who insists he record it. Danny claims it as his own, leading Rick to obsess about the credit he should receive.

It can be risky to make a single song a large part of a movie; the viewer’s perception of the movie could be clouded by their opinion of the song. The song Rick and Danny create, titled How to Write a Song (Without You), gets played a lot throughout the movie, as a whole song and as pieces in development and is central to a great deal of the plot. Luckily, in my case, I enjoyed the song very much.

The movie celebrates the power of music in general. Great music can be a unifying force, which we could use more of these days. The movie also does a good job at showing how music can mean different things to different people and how primary goals in life can change over time.