American Hot Wax

1978 "1959. New York City. The battleground was Rock and Roll. It was the beginning of an era. You shoulda been there."
6.9| 1h31m| PG| en| More Info
Released: 17 March 1978 Released
Producted By: Paramount
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Info

This is the story loosely based on Cleveland disc jockey Alan Freed, who introduced rock'n'roll to teenage American radio audiences in the 1950s. Freed was a source of great controversy: criticized by conservatives for corrupting youth with the "devil's music"; hated by racists for promoting African American music for white consumption; persecuted by law enforcement officials and finally brought down by the "payola" scandals.

Genre

Drama, History, Music

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Director

Floyd Mutrux

Production Companies

Paramount

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American Hot Wax Audience Reviews

Vashirdfel Simply A Masterpiece
Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews
Allison Davies The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.
Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.
fbm72751 The two things I like about this film is the music and the 1950's re-creations, plus seeing a young Jay Leno who really grew up during the next 14 years before replacing Johnny Carson. But from there it's all downhill. The chronology is positively awful and those who lived in the 1950s as well as fans of such will spot it instantly. The movie begins around the late Buddy Holly's birthday (referenced twice) so that would make it September 7, 1959. That part would pass as Freed was still on the air until November. But then we hear supposedly new songs being rehearsed which wasn't so at all. Songs like Tweedlee Dee, Come Go With Me and I Wonder Why were from 1955,'57 & '58 respectively. Then later we hear "Stay" being played which of course didn't not come out until the fall of 1960 which by then, Freed was long gone. Frankie Ford is showed recording Sea Cruise which in reality hit the charts in February. To really mess things up, it shows that school being out for the summer, so are we going back to May or fast forwarding to 1960? The part of Jerry Lee Lewis performing at the festival in front of a cheering crowd could be authentic as Freed was the one DJ who still played his records but highly unlikely as most were not ready to forgive Jerry just yet. The advertisement in that this was the beginning of that era was in fact totally the opposite as by latter 1959, the 1950s rock & roll party was about over. Lewis was pretty much done in latter 1958. The deaths of Buddy Holly and two others was a blow that proved difficult to recover from. Chuck Berry went to jail towards the end of the year and with the payola scandal knocking Freed out of the picture, the party was indeed over and the music would mellow out for the next four years into the so-called "innocent years".
carth-690-695176 The thing is about movies like that, that they always give illusion of being good.The only people to give review of this are the only people who actually bothered to see it, and mostly liked it due to ... air pressure anomaly of some sort.To start of, this is that kind of "Mess around" movie, which is basically around nothing, that kind of movie where you can without haste go to WC if you will, and loose nothing. A man, who is named Alan Freed in credits, goes around everywhere and talking to people.Yes just like that, goes talking to people from the beginning until the end.There would be never a second of silence in this movie, so as distinctive talk too.Maybe its that particular recording i seen, but boommick must have been attached to a camera.Speaking about that, camera work is inventive as in morning news.Corner shot, corner shot, back shot, oh a shot from upstairs, genius. Okay now for less technical details. While i liked the man who played Alan Freed as an actor, i didn't liked him as a man who played Alan Freed in this movie.He has a charisma and naturality, but he is not Alan Freed, and not Alan Freed in this movie. The characters.Check - we have characters.A composer girl, Buddy Holly fan boy and a vocal group.Yes and i am the walrus.As much as this statement impresses you, as much as those character develop.They just exist, and thats all.We have here a scene with a girl who doesn't want to go to the college, and conversation with her parents.Oh wait, it never existed.Because actually i don't have any memories in my mind to connect this to anything. The whole movie is just like a big deleted scene.Or like a canceled TV- pilot that managed to finish its own plot line even before starting the series.EVEN BEFORE STARTING THE PILOT. That kind of movie that gives illusions.See it has a few "features" that are not actually bad, in fact they taking you imagination the whole movie just to keep you busy.And while you think about them, the movie is over, and your judgment is based on them.(That explains overwhelmingly positive reviews in here).We got Jerry Lee and Chuckie, boy who says "Buddy Holly is alive" and a bum playing Little Richard on trash bins.When you swimming the ocean of dullness, you can notice every minor water circle that appears.While there are greater movies that are ocean of awesomeness, you see every minor water circle of flaws, which is one of paradoxes of human being. The verdict.The movie exists.Imagine you driving a car to work and thinking about making a movie about Alan Freed for a few seconds.While HAR-HAR, that movie exists, and it exists with all ideas you came up with for those few seconds.Thats the only purpose of this movie i see. Why am i even writing this: barely 100 people saw that movie, excluding all who parted in making.I don't know how about extras, if they never were told the name of this movie, probably they wouldn't be able to find it anywhere. This movie isn't kind of movie where people wear ugly masks and throwing stupid lines, i mean grade z movie: This is a movie you expect to be good, but it just annoys you on technical way.Its not like you got punch in a balls, rather then you got continuously got bitten by mosquitoes for 2 hours. I give it three, okay? Just because I'm in good mood. And respect to Alan Freed.
TSMChicago What a great character study where the music itself plays an essential role.We are treated to several scenes where the creative process of producing a rock and roll classic is depicted. Sure, they take a few liberties with history, but the essence of the music and the era is so true to life. Casting a recording studio veteran (Richard Perry) as the producer who finally coaxes "Come and Go With Me" out of an inexperienced group of singers was film-making genius.Lorraine Newman as Teenage Louise was an obvious recognition of the accomplishments of Carole King.Including performances by Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis and Screamin' Jay Hawkins added an air of authenticity to the climatic concert in Brooklyn.Tim McIntire's performance as Alan Freed captured the pioneer disc jockey's habit of tapping the beat of the songs with a pencil in the broadcast booth.The singers portraying The Chesterfields make another appearance in Floyd Mutrux's 1980 comedy riot "The Hollywood Knights" along with Fran Drescher and Moosie Drier. And lets not forget a very young Jay Leno as Mookie, Alan Freed's driver.A wonderful film that deserves a legitimate DVD release with all the extras. Let's solve those music royalty issues and get this movie out to the public.
helpless_dancer Amusing look at Hollywood's version of the birth of rock n' roll. Some good old tunes were played throughout, the acting was good, the radio station looked like the real thing, but some of the picture didn't ring true [and I don't mean Chuck Berry's lousy acting]. Those rabid anti-rockers were so far out with their "rock music will end civilization" rant as to be totally hilarious; although there were some back then that held that opinion. I liked the film, the doo-wop harmony singers were great, McIntyre played his character to the hilt, and it just felt like going back in time to re-live the events all over. The old timer rockers should go for this one.