The Dirt lives up to its name...
Braden White
 |
| Netflix© |
"Cringy" is a word used by kids in comment sections and would immediately discredit anyone attempting legitimate criticism.
The Dirt is cringy.
The cinematic retelling of the career of the infamous hard rock band Mötley Crüe, The Dirt, based on their autobiography of the same name, is advertised as an "unflinching" portrayal of the group's controversial career. Given the subject matter, this could've been something really interesting, as arguably no other band better embodied the drug and sex-fueled mayhem that falls in line with your Christian grandmother's nightmarish perception of rock & roll. On top of this, that sweet sweet Netflix backing meant the filmmakers had the chance to accurately depict the madness without fear of box office repercussions. This really seemed like a fresh formula after Bohemian Rhapsody mutilated the story of one of the most outrageous and influential homosexual figures in the music industry into a PG-13 package that could even appeal to China.
Unfortunately, The Dirt doesn't even try to escape the tired and boring format of the musical biopic. All the trademarks are here, the flashforward in the introduction, the assembling of "misfit" personalities, the extremely sudden rise to superstardom, the montage of success, the dramatic downfall at the end of the second act, the triumphant reunion, and the white lines of text at the end summarizing the less exciting final years. Hilariously, the film is so determined to check these boxes it forgets to do any of the setting up. The end result is a hollow catalog of unearned payoffs, which completely skip over any grunt work needed to make the audience connect on any level.
This is where my opening comment comes in, as there is nothing more "cringy" than someone without self-awareness, and The Dirt is anything but self-aware. The writers seem to lack the ability to look at their film as a whole. If they were going to fully commit to an entertaining high energy showcase of Crüe's craziest antics, that'd be fine albeit superficial. However, the writers try to load the back half with some of the cheesiest attempts at emotional character drama in a genre infamous for it. This violent clash of tones makes it clear that nobody knew what they were doing as the script takes itself so goddamn seriously while also featuring lines like, "Don't ever leave your girlfriend with Mötley Crüe, because they'll fuck her!"
Seamlessly transitioning into the dialogue problem, as everyone sounds like they were written by someone who took screenwriting lessons from Walk Hard and completely missed that it was a parody. Viewers are constantly slapped with secondhand embarrassment as characters unironically state how they are feeling or explicitly update us on their current situation. Occasionally we hear narration/fourth-wall-breaking, which only seems to really hammer home just how "cool" the band members are. In reality, this further shows how no one involved was aware of how inauthentic the film feels. Of course, being unfortunate, as authenticity was one of The Dirt's main selling points.
Subtlety is some strange foreign concept in The Dirt where we can always rely on information and feelings being laid out to us bluntly. This isn’t too off-putting during the avalanche of chaos in the first half, but when the film tries to slow down for more serious moments this issue becomes bewildering. Despite what the melancholic piano background might tell you, nothing is being handled gently here. There's something kind of tasteless about a scene of Nikki Sixx discussing the ethnicity of the cats from “Lady and the Tramp” with his heroin dealer. More than almost any other band of its time Mötley Crüe's story has the potential for examing the decaying effects of stardom and drug use buried beneath loud music and a loud lifestyle. They weren't rockstars one day and depressed addicts the next. Although the Netflix bio is quick to label the group as "misfits" we don't go diving into any of the band members' psyches even though there supposedly so intriguing they don't fit in with the rest of us. Ultimately, there is nothing to think about in The Dirt that it doesn't outright say to you.
As to how the band members were portrayed, "unlikeable" is what they were going for, but "bland" likely isn't. Against Bohemian Rhapsody, which would've been terrified to feature a member of Queen with something as unflattering as having a strand of hair out of place, The Dirt has no issue with dragging their band through the most humiliating stories of their career. This is a nice change of pace, however, in terms of actual characterization, nobody receives service close to the depth that Freddie Mercury got. While this could be attributed to a stronger focus on equal screentime it doesn't change the fact that at the end of the hour and a half runtime, I still couldn't tell you the difference between 3 of the 4 band members' personalities. Aside from the older, grouchy guitarist, there was no effort put giving them different personalities which would've helped all the character moments to land a lot better. It's hard to care about their personal struggles when I can't tell who's voice is narrating or remember which of the drug addicts with distractingly chiseled jawlines was the one with the drug problem.
The Dirt is cringy.
The cinematic retelling of the career of the infamous hard rock band Mötley Crüe, The Dirt, based on their autobiography of the same name, is advertised as an "unflinching" portrayal of the group's controversial career. Given the subject matter, this could've been something really interesting, as arguably no other band better embodied the drug and sex-fueled mayhem that falls in line with your Christian grandmother's nightmarish perception of rock & roll. On top of this, that sweet sweet Netflix backing meant the filmmakers had the chance to accurately depict the madness without fear of box office repercussions. This really seemed like a fresh formula after Bohemian Rhapsody mutilated the story of one of the most outrageous and influential homosexual figures in the music industry into a PG-13 package that could even appeal to China.
Unfortunately, The Dirt doesn't even try to escape the tired and boring format of the musical biopic. All the trademarks are here, the flashforward in the introduction, the assembling of "misfit" personalities, the extremely sudden rise to superstardom, the montage of success, the dramatic downfall at the end of the second act, the triumphant reunion, and the white lines of text at the end summarizing the less exciting final years. Hilariously, the film is so determined to check these boxes it forgets to do any of the setting up. The end result is a hollow catalog of unearned payoffs, which completely skip over any grunt work needed to make the audience connect on any level.
This is where my opening comment comes in, as there is nothing more "cringy" than someone without self-awareness, and The Dirt is anything but self-aware. The writers seem to lack the ability to look at their film as a whole. If they were going to fully commit to an entertaining high energy showcase of Crüe's craziest antics, that'd be fine albeit superficial. However, the writers try to load the back half with some of the cheesiest attempts at emotional character drama in a genre infamous for it. This violent clash of tones makes it clear that nobody knew what they were doing as the script takes itself so goddamn seriously while also featuring lines like, "Don't ever leave your girlfriend with Mötley Crüe, because they'll fuck her!"
Seamlessly transitioning into the dialogue problem, as everyone sounds like they were written by someone who took screenwriting lessons from Walk Hard and completely missed that it was a parody. Viewers are constantly slapped with secondhand embarrassment as characters unironically state how they are feeling or explicitly update us on their current situation. Occasionally we hear narration/fourth-wall-breaking, which only seems to really hammer home just how "cool" the band members are. In reality, this further shows how no one involved was aware of how inauthentic the film feels. Of course, being unfortunate, as authenticity was one of The Dirt's main selling points.
Subtlety is some strange foreign concept in The Dirt where we can always rely on information and feelings being laid out to us bluntly. This isn’t too off-putting during the avalanche of chaos in the first half, but when the film tries to slow down for more serious moments this issue becomes bewildering. Despite what the melancholic piano background might tell you, nothing is being handled gently here. There's something kind of tasteless about a scene of Nikki Sixx discussing the ethnicity of the cats from “Lady and the Tramp” with his heroin dealer. More than almost any other band of its time Mötley Crüe's story has the potential for examing the decaying effects of stardom and drug use buried beneath loud music and a loud lifestyle. They weren't rockstars one day and depressed addicts the next. Although the Netflix bio is quick to label the group as "misfits" we don't go diving into any of the band members' psyches even though there supposedly so intriguing they don't fit in with the rest of us. Ultimately, there is nothing to think about in The Dirt that it doesn't outright say to you.
As to how the band members were portrayed, "unlikeable" is what they were going for, but "bland" likely isn't. Against Bohemian Rhapsody, which would've been terrified to feature a member of Queen with something as unflattering as having a strand of hair out of place, The Dirt has no issue with dragging their band through the most humiliating stories of their career. This is a nice change of pace, however, in terms of actual characterization, nobody receives service close to the depth that Freddie Mercury got. While this could be attributed to a stronger focus on equal screentime it doesn't change the fact that at the end of the hour and a half runtime, I still couldn't tell you the difference between 3 of the 4 band members' personalities. Aside from the older, grouchy guitarist, there was no effort put giving them different personalities which would've helped all the character moments to land a lot better. It's hard to care about their personal struggles when I can't tell who's voice is narrating or remember which of the drug addicts with distractingly chiseled jawlines was the one with the drug problem.
The Dirt is kind of an oxymoron. It painstakingly makes sure to do everything the same as every other musical biopic but also gets everything wrong. It's as if someone had the instructions and materials to make a ladder but somehow ended up with step stool. In both cases, you can blame the same things: inexperience, lack of planning ahead, and overall no idea what you're doing.
2/10
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