Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story

Plot[edit]

In Springberry, Alabama, 1946, young Dewey Cox accidentally cuts his brother Nate in half with a machete. The trauma causes him to lose his sense of smell. Dewey meets a blues guitarist who discovers his life experience instilled in him a natural affinity for playing blues.


In 1953, Dewey performs at a school talent show and drives the crowd wild with his song "Take My Hand," and his father kicks him out of the house, calling it the "Devil's music". A 14-year-old Dewey leaves Springberry with his 12-year-old-girlfriend Edith; they soon marry and have a baby.


Working at an all-African American nightclub, Dewey replaces singer Bobby Shad onstage and impresses Hasidic Jew record executive L'Chaim. While recording a rockabilly rendition of "That's Amore", he is berated by an executive. A desperate Dewey performs "Walk Hard," a song inspired by a speech he gave Edith, which restores the executive's belief in Judaism and rockets him to superstardom.


The song quickly becomes a hit and Dewey becomes caught up in the rock 'n' roll lifestyle. He soon performs his first concert as the following act to Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, and The Big Bopper. Dewey is introduced to marijuana by his drummer Sam and becomes unfaithful to Edith. Dewey's father informs him that his mother has died while dancing to Dewey's song and blames Dewey's music for her death.


Distraught, Dewey finds Sam using cocaine and partakes, resulting in a cocaine-fueled punk rock performance. Choir-girl Darlene Madison enters Dewey's life, and he produces several sexually suggestive hit records amid their courtship. He weds Darlene while still married to Edith, which leads to both women leaving him, after which Dewey purchases drugs from an undercover cop. After he serves time in prison and in rehab, Darlene returns.


They move to Berkeley, California in 1966 during the counterculture movement. Dewey's new singing style is compared to that of Bob Dylan, which he angrily denies. In the next scene, a music video shows that Dewey's new song mimics Dylan's style, including opaque lyrics ("The mouse with the overbite explained/how the rabbits were ensnared/ and the skinny scanty sylph/ trashed the apothecary diplomat/ inside the three-eyed monkey/ within inches of his toaster-oven life."). On a band visit to India, Dewey takes LSD with the Beatles, leading to a Yellow Submarine-esque hallucination.


Dewey becomes consumed with creating his masterpiece Black Sheep (a homage to Brian Wilson's Smile). The band resents his insane musical style and abusive behavior and breaks up; Darlene, also unable to deal with him, leaves him for Glen Campbell. During another stint in rehab, Dewey is visited by the ghost of Nate, who ridicules his self-pity and tells him to start writing songs again.


In the 1970s, Dewey now hosts a CBS variety television show but is unable to compose a masterpiece for his brother. Nate reappears and urges him to reconcile with their father. Dewey and his father wind up dueling with machetes; despite having trained years for this moment, his father cuts himself in half, forgives Dewey for Nate's death, tells him to be a better father, and dies. Dewey breaks down and destroys almost everything in his home.


Dewey is approached by one of his illegitimate children and decides to reconnect with his many offspring. In 1992, a divorced Darlene returns to him. Finally realizing what is most important, Dewey regains his sense of smell and remarries her.


In 2007, L'Chaim's son Dreidel informs Dewey of his popularity with young listeners through rapper Lil' Nutzzak's sampling of "Walk Hard." Dewey learns he is to receive a lifetime achievement award. They want him to sing a song at the ceremony, but Dewey is reluctant, fearing his old temptations. However, with his family's support, he reunites with his band and is finally able to create one great masterpiece, summing up his entire life with his final song, "Beautiful Ride," while also deciding against trying a drug offered to him.


A title card reveals that Dewey died three minutes after this final performance, which then also reads "Dewford Randolph Cox, 1936–2007." A post-credits scene is a short black-and-white clip of "the actual Dewey Cox, April 16, 2002" (still played by Reilly).

Reception[edit]

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 74% based on 134 reviews. The site's consensus states: "A parody that pokes fun at rock stars and reductive biopics alike, this comedy sings in large part because of stellar performances and clever original music."^[12] On Metacritic the film has a score of 63 out of 100 based on reviews from 22 critics.^[13]


Roger Ebert scored the film three out of four and wrote: "Instead of sending everything over the top at high energy, like Top Secret! or Airplane!, they allow Reilly to more or less actually play the character, so that, against all expectations, some scenes actually approach real sentiment."^[14] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone magazine wrote: "The tricky thing about parody movies is that the jokes get old fast and they're hit-and-miss. Walk Hard, a spoof of every musical biopic from Ray to Walk the Line, is guilty on both counts. How lucky that when the jokes do hit, they kick major ass."^[15] A 2022 review of the best comedy films of the 21st century placed this at sixth.^[16]


The film was not commercially successful, taking $18 million at the US box office which was less than the film's $35 million budget.^[2]


John C. Reilly received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance in a Musical or Comedy and a nomination for Best Original Song.^[17]

Along with a backing band "The Hardwalkers", Reilly made seven musical appearances as Dewey Cox in the weeks prior to the film's release date.^[20]


Several fake commercials were aired including one with John Mayer, hinting Dewey might be his father.