This Is Spinal Tap (Special Edition)
starring: Fran Drescher, Christopher Guest, Bruno Kirby, Patrick Macnee, Michael McKean
directed by: Rob Reiner
directed by: Rob Reiner
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Product Description:
In 1982 legendary British heavy metal band Spinal Tap attempt an American comeback tour accompanied by a fan who is also a film-maker. The resulting documentary, interspersed with powerful performances of Tap's pivotal music and profound lyrics, candidly follows a rock group heading towards crisis.
Amazon.com:
Director Marty DiBergi (Rob Reiner) solemnly alerts us to the glory that was Spinal Tap in his introduction to this "rockumentary" about the legendary British heavy-metal group, featuring lead guitarist Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest), lead singer David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean), bassist Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer), and a succession of drummers whose careers were cut short by spontaneously combusting on their stool, drowning in somebody else's vomit, or otherwise perishing in untimely fashion. Under DiBergi's studious interrogation, the band and their familiars retrace the band's evolution from head-bopping Mersey Beat poseurs to head-banging metal poseurs, each change in musical direction or tonsorial chic having little effect on the surviving trio's sublime idiocy. For, as St. Hubbins (he's the "deep" one, relatively speaking) sagely observes, "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever."
Happily for us, director Reiner, who developed the underlying story line with Guest and former Credibility Gap pranksters McKean and Shearer, stays squarely on the right side of the line, even as his writer-actors remain hilariously trapped on the other side. In lieu of a formal shooting script, the quartet created an extensive and detailed band history ripe with the sort of dead-pan detail that hard-core rock historians and screwball aficionados will savor on countless replays; with the three Tap members also musicians themselves, the "band" developed its stage act under the unsuspecting noses of L.A. club denizens, who accepted them as just as loud, flashy, sexist, and obvious as any other mullet-tressed, leather-garbed brigade of guitar slingers, circa 1984. The resulting footage thus manages to lob its punch lines and build its characters (including some thinly veiled character assassinations of various industry folks) with a loose, tossed-away verve rooted in the improvisational approach. This Is Spinal Tap remains the funniest, and most truthful, look at rock culture ever filmed and a personal best for all involved. --Sam Sutherland
In 1982 legendary British heavy metal band Spinal Tap attempt an American comeback tour accompanied by a fan who is also a film-maker. The resulting documentary, interspersed with powerful performances of Tap's pivotal music and profound lyrics, candidly follows a rock group heading towards crisis.
Amazon.com:
Director Marty DiBergi (Rob Reiner) solemnly alerts us to the glory that was Spinal Tap in his introduction to this "rockumentary" about the legendary British heavy-metal group, featuring lead guitarist Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest), lead singer David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean), bassist Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer), and a succession of drummers whose careers were cut short by spontaneously combusting on their stool, drowning in somebody else's vomit, or otherwise perishing in untimely fashion. Under DiBergi's studious interrogation, the band and their familiars retrace the band's evolution from head-bopping Mersey Beat poseurs to head-banging metal poseurs, each change in musical direction or tonsorial chic having little effect on the surviving trio's sublime idiocy. For, as St. Hubbins (he's the "deep" one, relatively speaking) sagely observes, "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever."
Happily for us, director Reiner, who developed the underlying story line with Guest and former Credibility Gap pranksters McKean and Shearer, stays squarely on the right side of the line, even as his writer-actors remain hilariously trapped on the other side. In lieu of a formal shooting script, the quartet created an extensive and detailed band history ripe with the sort of dead-pan detail that hard-core rock historians and screwball aficionados will savor on countless replays; with the three Tap members also musicians themselves, the "band" developed its stage act under the unsuspecting noses of L.A. club denizens, who accepted them as just as loud, flashy, sexist, and obvious as any other mullet-tressed, leather-garbed brigade of guitar slingers, circa 1984. The resulting footage thus manages to lob its punch lines and build its characters (including some thinly veiled character assassinations of various industry folks) with a loose, tossed-away verve rooted in the improvisational approach. This Is Spinal Tap remains the funniest, and most truthful, look at rock culture ever filmed and a personal best for all involved. --Sam Sutherland
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Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: 
- "They're like poets." "They're like Shelley and Byron."
THIS IS SPINAL TAP has to be one of if not the funniest parody movies ever made.Heavy metal music (especially when its performers and fans take it too seriously) is inherent with ridiculous elements that seem made to be spoofed.Director Rob Reiner (who appears in the film as documentary maker Marty) and actors Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer playing the three lead musicians in Spinal Tap capitalize on the silliness and take it to outrageous and hilarious lengths with their ... Read More
Rating: 
- An interesting "mockumentry" on rock bands.
I was pretty hyped about this movie before I rented it. While it's nowhere near the comedy masterpiece some people make it out to be I did really enjoy it. Some people say it's metal but the music is really just glam rock, a bad Kiss ripoff at it's peak. I know the music is all just a joke, but if you're going to make us listen to it please make it at least passable. Luckily the music isn't the center of the movie. The acting is pretty solid all around, and very convincing. The real highlight of the ... Read More
Rating: - Marty DiBergi gave Spinal Tap a huge career boost with this film.
I've been a fan of Spinal Tap since they went under the name of The (New) Originals. After the tragic gardening death of their first drummer, John "Stumpy" Pepys, Tap tapped Eric "Stumpy Joe" Childs to fill the fills and thus began their journey of reputation as England's loudest band. I remember when they opened for Deep Purple in 1972, Ritchie Blackmore, watching backstage, was so intimidated by them that he locked himself in a bathroom for the rest of the night and his band had to soldier on playing ... Read More
Rating: - Spinal Tap
A look on how it might be to be a big rock star ona funny side.
Rating: - One of the best films of the 80s and among the funniest of all time
David, Nigel and Derek - the holy trinity of rock, the founding members of England's loudest band, the poets behind "Big Bottom" and "Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You Tonight" - are the subjects of the first and still the best mock/rockumentary "This Is Spinal Tap" (a film by Marty Dibergi/Rob Reiner). Following the band on their first U.S. tour in over five years, Dibergi goes where no other filmmaker has gone before - deep inside Tap's history, exploring the lean years ("Gimmie Some Money"), the innocent years ... Read More
- "They're like poets." "They're like Shelley and Byron."THIS IS SPINAL TAP has to be one of if not the funniest parody movies ever made.Heavy metal music (especially when its performers and fans take it too seriously) is inherent with ridiculous elements that seem made to be spoofed.Director Rob Reiner (who appears in the film as documentary maker Marty) and actors Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer playing the three lead musicians in Spinal Tap capitalize on the silliness and take it to outrageous and hilarious lengths with their ... Read More
- An interesting "mockumentry" on rock bands.I was pretty hyped about this movie before I rented it. While it's nowhere near the comedy masterpiece some people make it out to be I did really enjoy it. Some people say it's metal but the music is really just glam rock, a bad Kiss ripoff at it's peak. I know the music is all just a joke, but if you're going to make us listen to it please make it at least passable. Luckily the music isn't the center of the movie. The acting is pretty solid all around, and very convincing. The real highlight of the ... Read More
- Marty DiBergi gave Spinal Tap a huge career boost with this film.I've been a fan of Spinal Tap since they went under the name of The (New) Originals. After the tragic gardening death of their first drummer, John "Stumpy" Pepys, Tap tapped Eric "Stumpy Joe" Childs to fill the fills and thus began their journey of reputation as England's loudest band. I remember when they opened for Deep Purple in 1972, Ritchie Blackmore, watching backstage, was so intimidated by them that he locked himself in a bathroom for the rest of the night and his band had to soldier on playing ... Read More
- Spinal TapA look on how it might be to be a big rock star ona funny side.
- One of the best films of the 80s and among the funniest of all timeDavid, Nigel and Derek - the holy trinity of rock, the founding members of England's loudest band, the poets behind "Big Bottom" and "Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You Tonight" - are the subjects of the first and still the best mock/rockumentary "This Is Spinal Tap" (a film by Marty Dibergi/Rob Reiner). Following the band on their first U.S. tour in over five years, Dibergi goes where no other filmmaker has gone before - deep inside Tap's history, exploring the lean years ("Gimmie Some Money"), the innocent years ... Read More
