See it at the Movies

RICKI AND THE FLASH

with Joyce & Don Fowler
Posted 8/14/15

* * * *

(Family drama)

Meryl Streep can do no wrong. She brings her A game to every role she plays.

This time, it is an aging rock star who gave up a comfortable family life to hit the road …

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See it at the Movies

RICKI AND THE FLASH

Posted

* * * *

(Family drama)

Meryl Streep can do no wrong. She brings her A game to every role she plays.

This time, it is an aging rock star who gave up a comfortable family life to hit the road and try to become a rock star.

We find Ricki (Streep) playing in a rock band called The Flash in a California bar where the small crowd adores her. So does Greg, her guitar player (Rick Springfield).

Ricki gets a call from her former husband (Kevin Kline) that her daughter Julie (real life daughter Mamie Gummer) is despondent and suicidal after the breakup of her marriage.

Ricki flies to Indianapolis, and the fun begins. There is tension among the family members over a mother who would abandon her husband and three children to seek fame and fortune as a rock star.

The truth is that Ricki works days as a supermarket cashier and lives in a crummy apartment to survive, while her husband has remarried and lives in a mansion with a swimming pool.

Can Ricki atone for leaving her family to do her own thing? If so, there’s a lot of baggage in the way. This could have been just another dysfunctional family soap opera, but some sharp writing and terrific performances by Kline, Streep and Gummer make it work.

Who’s right and who’s wrong? Everyone takes a bit of the blame as these broken people come to grips with the past and present. Because they all seem so real, you care for all of them, even the new controlling wife and mother (Audra McDonald).

The music is great, and Streep can handle a song quite well.

It all leads to a big wedding of Ricki’s son, which looks like a road to disaster but turns into something quite different.

I’m not surprised that Joyce, the romantic, loved this movie. I am surprised that I liked it as much as I did.

Rated PG-13, with some profanity, sexual references and drug use. Mature teens, especially those with divorced parents, may gain some insights.

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