SONG SUNG BLUE (2025) is a feel good (but also sad) movie about the power of music, based on a 2008 documentary I hadn’t heard of about a Neil Diamond tribute band. There is a family member not mentioned in the movie who says it’s “all lies,” but from what I’ve read the basic outline stays reasonably close to the true events, and that leads to an unusual structure. For a while it hews pretty closely to a familiar underdog musician dramedy formula. Then life, even in its streamlined-for-narrative-purposes form, throws in some curveballs that make the story seem pretty crazy.

I wanted to watch it because it’s written and directed by Craig Brewer, and its first chunk is like a family friendly version of some of what made his breakthrough HUSTLE & FLOW so appealing – this group of regular nobodies coming together and trying to achieve their musical dreams, which are small time by movie standards but huge in their lives and in their hearts. Mike Sardina (Hugh Jackman, VAN HELSING) is a singer and guitar player who performs under the name Lightning, wears a lightning bolt insignia on his jacket and medallion, likens it to being a super hero, but mostly he’s just a regular Clark Kent working as a mechanic, going to meetings, trying not to be a terrible father to his teenage daughter Angelina (singer-songwriter King Princess).

Then, while almost performing at a carnival gig as a favor for a friend, he meets Patsy Cline impersonator Claire Cartwright (Kate Hudson, THE SKELETON KEY) and falls in love. They’re both middle aged single parents whose musical talents have turned into hobbies, they have a nice time together, next thing you know he wants to call her Thunder and perform Neil Diamond covers with her. They agree that he’ll be a Neil interpreter, not impersonator, but he does start combing his hair like Neil, and she sticks to keyboards and backup vocals.

My favorite Brewer movie besides HUSTLE & FLOW is DOLEMITE IS MY NAME, which was written by the masters of outsider biopics Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski. They had nothing to do with this, but it really seems like their type of material, especially in its cast of lovable supporting eccentrics. Mike’s very supportive manager Dave Watson (Fisher Stevens, THE BROTHER FROM ANOTHER PLANET) is also his dentist. His friend Mark (Michael Imperioli, JUNGLE FEVER) is a Buddy Holly impersonator who admits he’s pained to be so much older than Buddy ever lived to be, takes off the glasses and volunteers to play guitar in the band. Claire’s co-worker Babs (Jackie Cox) does drag as Barbra Streisand and finds her costumes. They also get help from a James Brown impersonator called Sex Machine (Mustafa Shakir, LOVE HURTS), and Jim Belushi (THE PRINCIPAL) has a delightful turn as Tom D’Amato, who Dave presents as a big shot connection to the casino circuit and then it turns out his job is just driving shuttle buses.

But he does hook them up, and drives the bus when they tour. I enjoyed Mike’s deep connection to the Diamond catalog, which means resenting the popularity of “Sweet Caroline” and insisting on opening with “Soolaimon.” I think it’s a beautiful idea that he expresses his emotions through the songs even though they’re not his own. That’s a little different from the conventional wisdom on artistic expression.

Lightning and Thunder accidentally get bigger than they ever thought possible (SPOILER: they open for Pearl Jam; it’s funny that a movie about impersonators has an actor [John Beckwith] playing Eddie Vedder). It feels like the climax of a certain type of movie, but it’s too early for that, which means something has to go wrong. The way it does would be much too random for fiction (HUGE SPOILER FOR THOSE OF US WHO DIDN’T KNOW THIS WAS GONNA HAPPEN): a car runs Claire over in their front yard while she’s gardening! She lives, but loses a leg, plunges into depression and a haze of painkillers, doesn’t feel up for singing but gets jealous of or hurt by Lightning performing without Thunder even though it’s just a gig hosting karaoke at a Thai restaurant. For a while it feels like a subversion of the music biopic format because these outsider underdogs reach a level of success that they never even asked for, then everything goes to shit for totally unrelated reasons. It’s not the usual rock star self destruction. More like regular destruction.

A nice thing that probly wouldn’t happen in a completely fictional story is that he remains sober the whole time. It starts on his sober birthday, the changes in his life test him, his daughter worries about him and reminds him to go to meetings, but of all of the dark turns things take, starting to drink again is not one of them. That’s nice.

There are many sweet parts to the story, especially involving Claire’s daughter Rachel (Ella Anderson, MOTHER’S DAY) and son Dana (Hudson Hensley, THE WILDMAN OF SHAGGY CREEK). I love the bonding between the stepsisters and their unlikely level of enthusiasm for their parents’ Neil Diamond covers. It’s a movie about a family supporting each other, and it’s also a very sincere love story. Lightning and Thunder need to make music, and they need to make it together.

I also love the supporting characters of the Thai family at the restaurant. For me one of the most beautiful moments in the whole movie is when the father, Somechai (Shyaporn Theerakulstit, GOD OF VAMPIRES) marks the anniversary of his wife’s death sitting at a table with Lightning, singing sad Neil songs together. And since I didn’t know how much there was to go (because I didn’t know the real story) I really thought it was a perfect climax when (spoiler) Lightning and Thunder had their big reunion in front of a small audience of diners at Charm Thai Cuisine. For some reason that no one will ever be able to determine I love stories about obscure artists who pour their hearts into, and find their identity from, small time endeavors that are hugely meaningful to them even if not that many people care. (See also RICKI AND THE FLASH.)

Then the story continues, feeling more standard again, even repetitive as they achieve unlikely glory again, but as in life not everybody lives happily ever after. It’s kind of an odd movie because it feels pretty conventional and fluffy until it puts you through an ordeal.

This was the last one I needed to watch to have seen all the 2025 Oscar nominees for acting, because Hudson was nominated for best actress. I have to admit I was once a Hudson skeptic. I’m embarrassed of what I wrote about her in ALMOST FAMOUS, and if she wasn’t then she has undeniably grown into something interesting, being a highlight of GLASS ONION and now really smashing this one. She does a (reportedly accurate, though that’s not important to me) Milwaukee accent and a sweetheart-Midwest-lady thing that feels so natural and so unlike how we’ve seen her previously; she looks authentic, not playing dressup; she sings well, and looks more like she’s playing keyboard than Jackman looks like he’s playing guitar. Then the accident happens and she has to struggle and I thought uh oh, that’s why they nominated her. She goes dark. She loses all hope and light and releases all the bile and bitterness she always kept in check. Hudson is great at it, but I kinda was more excited about it when it didn’t seem like a normal Oscar nominee role. That’s okay because her best work is in the last part, when lovable Thunder returns, having gone through all that and more I haven’t mentioned, and trying not to let it wreck her. This is more of a weeper than it first appears, but it left me happy.

Kinda fucked up though that they never mention that song he did about E.T.

p.s. I will leave you with this clip from Diamond’s remake of THE JAZZ SINGER which I have never seen in full but my old friend Shawn turned me on to the magic of the Ernie Hudson scene. Warning: Blackface