Hellen I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Alicia I love this movie so much

Scarlet The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Dana An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

rooprect Argh once again I'm the victim of a marketing scheme which ruined my enjoyment of this otherwise good film. You've probably noticed the first words on the DVD box in bold letters are: "THE GREATEST ROCK'N'ROLL FILM OF ALL TIME!" On the back another hyperbolic film critic raves "THE GREATEST ROCK'N'ROLL FILM EVER MADE!" And then it goes on to list "featuring music and appearances by..." and name-drops every famous act since 1965, even daring to play the Beatles card.DON'T. YOU. BELIEVE. IT.While Mayor of the Sunset Strip is an interesting, nostalgic trip to California's music scene in the last quarter of the 20th century, it's a far cry from "the greatest rock'n'roll film ever" or even any sort of rock'n'roll film. It lacks the music to make it a true rock'n'roll film.The focus is not on music but rather on the phenomenon of pop celebrity. Often the "music and appearances by..." are only 0.5 second clips of some celebrity shaking hands with Rodney. Some are just photographs.The bulk of the celebrity interviews are: Kim Fowley for 10-15 mins total, Nancy Sinatra for maybe 5 mins, Joan Jett for maybe 1 min, Cher 1 mins, Bowie 45 sec, Gwen Stefani 30 sec (but parts repeated to make it longer), Ray Manzarek 15 sec, and a few others for 15 sec or less. Tori Amos appears through the door of her trailer looking confused for exactly 1.5 seconds, and the Beatles "appearances" are just photos and stock footage.Marketing for this film is deceptive at best, dishonest at worst. If this sort of thing pisses you off as much as it does me, pumping your expectations to unrealistic heights then dropping you on your butt unfulfilled, then you may want to put down the ritzy DVD box, take a deep breath, remind yourself that it's just a mid-budget documentary, and enjoy it for what it's worth, not what it promises to be.Now about the movie itself. It suffers from a bit of identity crisis, at times trying to prove that Rodney is an icon whom we should adore, at times portraying him as a loser who never got his due. He is shown as a short, gentle, harmless man, but then we are shown images of him licking topless women and stories of him having sex with every groupie who ever hitched a ride to California. We are shown images of a shabby-looking home with holes in the furniture, but then it's made clear that he was the successful owner of a downtown nightclub where patrons and girls by the dozen would kill to get into his VIP room. I'm not sure what the filmmaker was trying to do. But the result was that I didn't feel any sympathy for Rodney by the end of the film, because it's obvious that he had more wine, women & song in 1 day than most of us have in our miserable lives. Is the director's point that he didn't get enough??Rodney himself has a cute boyish face which makes him instantly lovable, but his awkward, 1-word answers to the director's questions become slightly irritating by the end of the film. I certainly don't fault Rodney for playing his cards close to his chest; he strikes me as a very private man with serious reservations about having his life splayed out on a buffet table. I fault the filmmakers for not coaxing the good stuff out of him. And I'm not talking about dirt & drama, I'm talking about the simple passion for music that drove Rodney. Would it have killed the filmmakers to spend 5 minutes asking him what his favorite song or band or style was? No, instead it always seems to be "who's the most famous person you met?"Well, lack of music notwithstanding, this is an interesting documentary about an underdog. It doesn't really tell a story, not like the excellent "Anvil! The Story of Anvil" (now THAT ONE can indeed be called the greatest rock'n'roll film ever). In Mayor of the Sunset Strip I feel as though the filmmakers failed to deliver. That plus the absurdly inflated expectations I had from the DVD box made this a ho-hum experience.If you're truly interested in discovering "the greatest rock'n'roll film ever", please check out the aforementioned "Anvil" (even if you're not a metal fan, it's charmingly honest). Also check out the classic satires "This Is Spinal Tap", "Still Crazy", "The Ruttles: All You Need Is Cash", the brilliant documentary "Searching for Sugar Man", and if you can stand a little 80s cheeze there is tremendous poetry in "Eddie & the Cruisers". When I consider all these terrific rock'n'roll films through the decades, there is no doubt in my mind that Mayor just isn't in the same class. As long as you don't expect it to be, you'll have a good time.

Roland E. Zwick If "Mayor of the Sunset Strip" were not a documentary, no one would ever believe the story it tells. The film chronicles the life of Rodney Bingenheimer, the L.A. DJ who helped to launch the careers of many of the most influential bands in rock music history. However, if you're expecting Rodney to be a dashing, high-powered music exec with loads of cash and garages full of fancy sport cars, think again. He is, in fact, a painfully shy and unassuming man who seems totally out of place in the celebrity swirl of which he became so integral a part beginning in the 1960's. This is what makes his story and the film so fascinating, for who could have imagined that this gnomish young lad from Mountain View, California - essentially abandoned by both his mother and father and rejected by his peers - would somehow manage to make himself the center of attention for some of the greatest rock celebrities of the 1960's and '70's. Everybody who was anybody knew and adored Rodney, and, after he landed a gig as DJ at L.A.'s KROQ in the 1970's, he gave many struggling alternative artists their first real toehold on the radio, playing their records at a time when no other disc jockeys would touch them. The bands who practically owe their careers to Rodney Bingenheimer include Blondie, the Ramones, the Sex Pistols, the Runaways, the Go-Go's, No Doubt, Coldplay, and many many others. As a documentary, the film, written and directed by George Hickenlooper, takes a fairly conventional approach, combining images from Rodney's life with interviews by celebrities, relatives and friends commenting on him both as a person and as a phenomenon. The film provides a virtual who's who of some of the biggest names in the music business stepping up to the camera to have their say, most of it highly complimentary to the subject. Indeed, almost to a person, the interviewees talk about what a sweet, lovable guy Rodney is and how hobnobbing with so many celebrities has not diminished his innate humility and decency as a person. There is one moment in the film when Rodney allows his anger to get the better of him, but, most of the time, he comes across as a goodhearted, almost passive person who is surprisingly inarticulate and - one senses - not all that comfortable being the subject of a documentary. The film achieves a poignancy and sadness in its latter scenes when we discover that, despite all this notoriety among the glitterati in Hollywood, Rodney lives a rather isolated existence, never having found that one true love with whom he could settle down and make a life. In fact, the movie makes us question whether fame - or even proximity to the famous - can ever really lead to a happy, successful life. It's a lament we've heard many times before and will hear many times again."Mayor of the Sunset Strip" provides us with a kaleidoscopic view of the L.A. music scene from the mid 1960's to the present. Rodney's life becomes the forum for reliving all those exciting moments in which this parade of beautiful and talented people came to define the culture and eras of which they were a part. The film has an almost "Zelig" quality to it, as Rodney is photographed standing next to virtually every important rock artist to come down the pike in the last four decades.I must admit that, even after watching "Mayor of the Sunset Strip," I still don't claim to understand how Rodney achieved everything that he did, and maybe no film could ever really capture that magic alignment of elements that made it possible for a shy, insecure young boy from a broken family - yet a boy with dreams and an abiding love of rock 'n roll - to play such a crucial part in music history. I guess you had to actually be there to really understand it.My own experience with Rodney Bingenheimer is an extremely modest one. I once stood behind him while waiting to board a flight from San Jose to Burbank. Few people in the crowd seemed to know who he was, but an attractive young girl, obviously interested in pursuing a career in music, approached him and politely engaged him in conversation. Rodney, despite the fact that he could have simply ignored her advances and begged for privacy, instead turned his full attention to what it was she was saying, smiled demurely at her compliments, and offered her an opportunity to perform for him when they got back to L.A. It's that Rodney Bingenheimer who comes through in the film.

fleetmind As an Angeleno, I was a long-time listener to KROQ, but gave it up the day grunge came to town. I used to listen to Rodney back when he was on at a decent hour. He was so weird and you always felt like you were terribly cool and on-the-edge for listening to him. It is too bad KROQ abandoned Rodney's kind of music in favor of the crap they play today.But on to the movie itself. I thought it was excellent in its own right, which had the classic tragedy theme. Looking at it that way, this movie could not have been better.But from a music standpoint there was something lacking. Rodney is Rodney because of the music, his love of the music, his ear and knack for the music. There was plenty in this movie about the musicians but very little about the music they play. I would have liked a few comments along the lines of, "Oh, the first time I heard the opening riff of such-and-such a song," or "Man, when I saw so-and-so play for the first time at the Whiskey!" There is a curious lack of talk about the actual tunes in this movie. One DOES come away with the feeling that it was just celebrities that Rodney loved and not the art they created...and I know this is not the case.But back to the "tragedy" that was this movie's real purpose. It was so excruciating to watch some of these scenes. A truly great movie in this respect. The encounters with the family, the dumping of his mom's ashes, the freak-out with Chris Carter, the horrible, horrible side-story of the 50-year-old wannabe rock star. This movie was positively Shakespearean! And knowing what a tragic landscape Los Angeles really is, I loved that this was conveyed so well in this film; the Denny's, the stripmalls, the ugly apartment buildings.

marygreen25 Hello Rodney, You're the greatest. I love your contribution to the world. You and others like you were playing the best music in the early 80s. It was a great time. I'll bet many from different rock periods say the same thing about you.MaryNow for my take on the movie: I guess the theme is about fame and how it does not necessarily come with monetary riches. That is a powerful point. The only thing is I wish that there was less emphasis on Rodney's personal life and more about his love of rock.Rodney has remained pure to his love of new music and exposing us to allkinds of new rockers. Along the way, he mingled with the rich and famous,never benefitting from their success. He met some crafty folk like Kim Fowley. Wow, now he's something. In the end though, the interviews with some of theso-called friends of Rodney should have been cut. Their candid self-promoting callousness made me depressed. "Thin is in," Rodney says to the camera nextto a woman who later admits that she is not Rodney's gal, but just his friend. Why did that have to be included?Rodney probably has a great deal of valuable bootleg recordings or rare LPsand 45s that many of us love and love to hear about.More about the music and less about the sad facts in Rodney's life please. Can someone redo the movie?