Nimrods

Grade: D+

Nimrods takes some of the stupidest characters I’ve ever seen, drops them into the most ridiculous road trip plot, introduces more loose ends than it ties up, and hits shuffle on the Green Day playlist. It’s interesting that I saw it after The Rivals of Amziah King, which was a love letter to bluegrass/Appalachian music. Nimrods is the other side of that coin. It’s the side that landed face down in the muddy mosh pit.

The music sounds great. Green Day is a talented band, and in addition to their own songs, the soundtrack also features music that inspired them and was inspired by them. It takes place in the week and a half leading up to New Year’s Eve. The title cards don’t trust us enough to know math. They can’t just say “December 24.” Instead, they all say “December 24, 7 days before New Year’s Eve,” “December 28, 3 days before New Year’s Eve,” etc. Ugh. Wake me up when December ends, will ya?

Mason Thames (from How to Train Your Dragon and the Black Phone movies) plays Tommy, who is in the band Analog Dogs with his friends Fred (Kylr Coffman) and Chad (Ryan Foust). Characters constantly misread the band’s name, calling them things like “Anal Dogs” or “Anal OGs.” They finagle their way to the front of the line at a record store meet and greet, to drop off a demo tape for Green Day.

Tommy’s brother Wayne (Mark Ruffalo’s son Keen Ruffalo) wants to get back at Tommy for taking away the ladder and leaving him stranded on the roof while putting up Christmas decorations on December 20 (11 days before New Year’s Eve). Wayne and his friend Keith (Ignacio Diaz-Silverio) prank call one of the Analog Dogs, pretending to be a member of Green Day, inviting them to be their opening act on New Year’s Eve (0 days before New Year’s Eve, and 365 days before the next New Year’s Eve) at the Palladium in Los Angeles.

They blindly accept this 30 second “no caller I.D.” phone call as legit. Nobody questions anything, much less a contract, payment, or travel/venue/accommodation logistics. They just pack up, and on the road they go. They manage to steal three cars, and get away with a dine-and-dash. That’s an impressive feat when you hang out in the parking lot for so long afterwards. Fred Armisen has a one-scene cameo that is about as confusing as the movie seems to think is funny. Thames’s Regretting You co-star Mckenna Grace is planted in the movie as an immediate love interest for Tommy. Don’t get me started on how they make it into the Palladium, but by then, Tommy has learned that the whole thing was fake, while we see the other two rocking out to the music instead of thinking “Wait, weren’t we supposed to play before them?” Everything gets more and more inept and moronic.

I’m giving Nimrods the “plus” side of the grade, because in the midst of the inept, underdeveloped cinematic chaos, these actors have chemistry. It looks like they had the time of their lives making this. The camerawork and cinematography painted a nice picture. Maybe one day it will be a picture I want to look at. No points for guessing the song that plays over the sentimental montage at the end. It was inevitable. The happiest, and most unearned ending is forcefully shoehorned in. Long before it reaches its 107th minute, I was ready to say “good riddance.”

Grade: D+