Movie Review: Satisfaction

I was suckered into watching this movie mostly because it is such a historical anachronism. Julie Roberts is in it, and her name appears in the secondary credits, after Debbie Harry who is in the movie for about 90 seconds. Liam Neeson is one of the "stars" and his accent is FOB ("Fresh Off Boat"), including using the word "aye?" at the end of a sentence (much like the Canadian "eh?").

The star of this movie is Justine Bateman. Justine Bateman!!! While I watch her brother, Jason, on Arrested Development, I haven't heard of her for ages. I wonder what she's doing?

The plot is absurdly simple. Justine is the "smart girl" from a New Jersey backwater. Or maybe it's in one of the New York City boroughs. Who knows, who cares? Anyway, she is also the lead singer and mastermind of a garage band, of which Julia Roberts is one of the members. Their keyboardist quits/gets arrested/is pregnant and Justine has to enlist the aid of the boy-across-the-street, who has been playing classical piano his entire life, to be the new keyboardist because the band has an audition "at the shore."

The club owner is played by Neeson, who is also a great lyricist/songwriter who hasn't written anything since his wife's death.

Justine becomes his muse. What a surprise!

Julia has a lowlife boyfriend who wants her to give up her dream of rockstardom and marry him. She is attracted to a blue-blood type who hangs out at the beach. Blue-blood invites her to a party and makes a move, meaning he is crass after all. Old boyfriend comes to beach to find Julia, asks her to marry him. She says yes.

Will Julia marry old boyfriend?

Will Justine forego her scholarship to 1.) move in with Liam or 2.) tour Europe with the band?

Will Liam let her?

Will the blonde band member/guitarist/singer succeed in overdosing?

Will the female hard-as-nails drummer finally allow the keyboard boy-across-the-street to be her boyfriend?

Are the answers in doubt?

The singing isn't bad. It's mostly covers of old songs. The film was released in 1988, so the clothes and hair styles are either very bad (madras plaid pants on the men) or tres chic (crop tops, miniskirts, and leather vests never go out of style).

The movie wasn't bad--but it ain't a classic.

On the March Hare Scale: 2 tickets out of five, if only for Liam Neeson and the nostalgia factor. And the music wasn't half-bad, if you're old enough to remember 1988.