Micah Lloyd
Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.
Quiet Muffin
This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.
Staci Frederick
Blistering performances.
Alpay Sedat Durukan
I have watched the movie couple of times by now. For someone who gets really sad when people say "punk is dead", this movie really made me feel alive.It is not a documentary, that's why you should not expect hundred percent historical accuracy. What you should expect is full understanding of the birth of punk rock. Movie is definitely objective as it can be. Punk Rock is portrayed as an underground music which is for the misfits of the society. Movie does not portray this as a dramatic feature. Punk bands of the time are showed as who they really are. Great examples are the scenes including Debbie Harry and Ramones. In the movie, we can see whole concept of sex, drugs, and rock and roll as well.
mpurvismattp
I wasn't around the punk scene (although I love the music) and I'm not from New York, (or even the East coast for that matter) but I still know SH!T when I see it! This movie is SH!T!!! The film just comes across as so phony. Its trying to be cool and it's trying to be punk but it tries to damn hard and it just looks lame-o. The acting isn't great much of the time but the problem really stems from the lack of personality the characters were given in this film, that along with the squeaky clean studio sound of the "live performances" just doesn't ring true to me. It's not the worst movie I've ever seen but it might be the worst punk I've ever seen. You want a good punk movie watch Sid n Nancy or a documentary on the subject, that's my advice.
alfiecycling
this contains spoilers ! if you dig the music of the 70's and punk in particular you will enjoy this. I certainly did. This tells the story of the founding of the famous NY club CBGB and PUNK magazine. Hillel Kristal borrowed money from his mom to buy the Palace Bar in the Bowery.This after two bankruptcies...LOL. His daughter , Lisa, dropped out of college for lack of funds. So she is hired, fired then rehired by her father, Hillel aka Hilly. It has a superb cast and the CBGB set is spot on.Hilly and Lisa are played by Alan Rickman and Ashley Greene. I loved their performances. They are actually quite funny here.Hilly : "You gotta spend money to make money." Lisa : "You gotta have money to spend money to make money. And since you spend all the money you make,you don't have any money to spend. So you might wanna think about saving the money you make instead of spending the money you make"...Way to go Lisa ! Also, Ashley's New Yawk accent is right on the money.Freddy Rodriguez plays Idaho, a violin bowing homeless junkie that Hilly takes under his wing.We see a NY style shakedown of Hilly thwarted by his new found biker buddies, the Titans of Hell. We see The Ramones, Television, Talking Heads, The Dead Boys and, towards the very end, The Police all auditioning for Hilly to get a gig at CBGB. We also see Blondie and Iggy Pop singing, I Wanna Be Your Dog. And Patti Smith perform,Because The Night. I love this movie and have watched it numerous times because of where it takes me. Just before the closing credits Hilly says that he opened the club because he thought country music was gonna be the next big thing...and it was ...in Nashville.LOL.During the ending credits we see the real Talking Heads accepting their induction into the Rock'N' Roll Hall Of Fame and what they do to honor Hilly is so moving.That is a MUST SEE !The only negative I can talk about is the movie spends too much time on The Dead Boys. Apparently Hilly saw something in them and invested a lot of money to manage them and nearly lost his club to this band that eventually crashed and burned.
Hellmant
'CBGB': Four Stars (Out of Five)A biographical comedy film about the New York club CBGB and it's founder Hilly Kristal. It was directed by Randall Miller and written by Miller and Jody Savin (who worked on multiple screenplays with Miller). The film stars Alan Rickman as Hilly Kristal and co-stars the likes of Ashley Greene (of 'TWILIGHT' fame), Donal Logue, Freddy Rodriguez, Josh Zuckerman, Ahna O'Reilly and Richard de Klerk. It also features a number of other actors as famous rock stars; like Malin Akerman as Debbie Harry, Joel David Moore as Joey Ramone, Taylor Hawkins as Iggy Pop, Mickey Sumner as Patti Smith, Kyle Gallner as Lou Reed, Justin Bartha as Stiv Bators and Rupert Grint (of 'HARRY POTTER' fame) as Cheetah Chrome. I found the movie to be highly entertaining and informative.Rickman plays New York club owner Hilly Kristal, who opened CBGB in Manhattan in 1973. He originally planned to have country, bluesgrass and blues bands play there (which is what the name stands for) but instead turned it into an underground Rock 'n' Roll venue. It played only new and original music, from mostly punk and New Wave bands (like the Ramones, Misfits, The Dead Boys, Blondie, Talking Heads, Patti Smith Group, The Police and Joan Jett & The Bleackhearts to name a few). It's largely seen as the birthplace of American punk rock music. The film focuses on Kristal's struggles to keep the club open as he deals with many financial issues. He later became known as the 'godfather of punk'. The first genre of music I really got into (as a young adult) was punk and alternative music (mostly pop punk and ska punk bands at first but later more traditional punk rock music as well). One of my all-time favorite bands is the Ramones and I've always been fascinated by CBGB and the early 70s punk rock scene; so this movie was really interesting to me (I also found it to be highly entertaining). I was expecting a more serious biography film and was quite surprised to see a cartoonish style comedy flick (that takes a lot of creative liberties). Some punk rock fans might be upset by this but I liked it. I thought Rickman was great and Bartha, Grint and Moore are all scene-stealers as well (all of the performances are good in fact). I think it will go down in film history as a cult classic among film and music fans! If you're into the same style of music you're almost sure to be entertained.Watch our movie review show 'MOVIE TALK' at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJalgBjCCrg
