Any kid who has ever said: “Hey, let’s start a band” will be able to relate to Alan Parker’s musical tour of North Dublin – The Commitments.
We’ll air our biases at the get-go: We’re of Irish ancestry, can make our way through a heavy brogue and we like stories where talented underdogs struggle to make it in an uncaring world.
The Commitments has all that and more, including some biting Irish humor and some great, great music. American music. Soul music.
If you’ve made it this far in this review and you haven’t seen this little gem you may be shaking your head. Wait, we’re not talking traditional Dublin pub music? No fiddle? Tin whistle? Bodhrán?
Nope. Instead, the camera introduces us to a lean and very hungry Jimmy Rabbitte (Robert Arkins) – a self-promoting promoter from the streets of North Dublin, a kid with a dream. Jimmy’s idea is find enough like-minded fools to form a real band, a soul band. His logic is as persuasive as a paid-for pint: “The Irish are the blacks of Europe. Dubliners are the blacks of Ireland. North Dubliners are the blacks of Dublin.”
That’s it. Supported largely by its own charm, some great characters – and a few moments of musical magic that came together during filming – schoolteacher Roddy Doyle’s storyline takes us along as Jimmy searches for his band, and a way to get his disciples committed (get it?) to the soulful sound of Wilson Pickett and James Brown.
We’re drawn into a world of cobbled back alleys and the tick-tick of ankle snappingly high heels, raucous Irish weddings and a steady parade of characters – some of them talented, others not so much. Interestingly, a future U2 album cover figure makes an appearance, along with the pickers, players and singers you need to make a band.
The oldest member of the group and musical backbone is Joey “The Lip” Fagan (Johnny Murphy), a trumpet player who claims to have toured America with Wilson Pickett and Little Richard – and who immediately impresses Jimmy, charming the promoter as well as the band’s burgeoning bevy of comely backup singers. The spontaneous nature of music-making is captured as several back stories unfold at the same time, band members coming to terms with their own talent and power over a room as soon as the ladies put on their simple black cocktail dresses and the horn section finds its groove.
Pretty soon, the movie almost becomes documentary, a supposedly fictional band able to convince us that they’re real and can actually sing or play together.
In a case of Life becoming Art, we are introduced to the loutish, rollicking, unmade bed of a man named Deco Cuffe (Andrew Strong), a natural singer with the vocal power of a Joe Cocker who embarrasses himself at a drunken wedding before moving into the lead role of Jimmy’s band, his unmistakable talent instantly at odds with his considerable ego.
In real life, Strong as Deco Cuffe was the 16-year-old son of a Dublin singer the director had initially focused on, moving into the role when his father lost his voice and Parker cast him on the spot. The move ended up making the movie, Strong/Cuffe becoming a local sensation and lending the movie its driving energy.
Critics savaged “The Commitments” for its less-than-boffo ending, expecting perhaps a more polished Hollywood finish to a decidedly Irish tale. We mean, the band is coming together, the press is favorable and there’s a whiff of a visit by a musical heavyweight that, if it comes off as expected, could push them over the top. That things don’t exactly go as planned is more emblematic, in our opinion, of the music business and life itself than any need for a Big Finish ending.
In the end we’re left with some memorable characters and some great music (the movie has spawned some soundtrack albums and band reunions over the years), and that may be enough – especially for anyone who has dreamed of making it big and saying: “Hey, let’s start a band…”
Recently streamed on Amazon Prime, but can be hard to find.
Checking it out…..