While EDDIE AND THE CRUISERS II: EDDIE LIVES feels like a corny, straight-to-video followup to the low-budget but highly regarded cult film EDDIE AND THE CRUISERS... about a Jim Morrison-like possibly-dead rocker and the band he left behind... there's far more about the music here, played by Michael Pare's titular Eddie Wilson than what's in the CITIZEN KANE-inspired original's double-story that consists more of a present time keyboardist/lyricist Tom Berenger (literally replaced by another character in a flashback sequence) not fitting the band than the actual band leader or his music that Berenger injected "deep" lyrics into...
And, once again, Pare lip-syncs rocker John Cafferty's voice to perfection... he looks like Cafferty sounds... but each tune, unlike the Bruce Springsteen-inspired On The Dark Side that became an actual hit... are merely filler material...
So as Eddie collects and rehearses his new club band including a too-flashy lead guitarist (who, like Matthew Laurence's bassist Sal, thinks the music should be more lightweight), a wise sax player (this band is mostly sax), a muscular drummer and, inspired by Berenger, a geeky classically-trained pianist, the music doesn't add up to the possibility of Eddie getting a legit comeback beyond the news that would be garnered if he resurrected beyond his secret life as everyday construction worker... Also, during rehearsals, while Eddie insults his band into "getting it right", the glossy, recording-session-sounding music sounds exactly the same from beginning to end, so it's like trying to perfect music from a car commercial...
Also, gone is the mystique of the original's young perfect-looking Pare, seen through archive footage (without Tom Berenger in ANY shot)... and as he's supposed to have aged 20 years to fit the plot-line, the man himself looks like his own father, so the sex symbol playing rock star novelty that ignited the original is dead and gone...
However what's here is a lightweight video-rental, and EDDIE AND THE CRUISERS II: EDDIE'S BACK not only doesn't mind, but for the most part, revels in being just that.
And, once again, Pare lip-syncs rocker John Cafferty's voice to perfection... he looks like Cafferty sounds... but each tune, unlike the Bruce Springsteen-inspired On The Dark Side that became an actual hit... are merely filler material...
So as Eddie collects and rehearses his new club band including a too-flashy lead guitarist (who, like Matthew Laurence's bassist Sal, thinks the music should be more lightweight), a wise sax player (this band is mostly sax), a muscular drummer and, inspired by Berenger, a geeky classically-trained pianist, the music doesn't add up to the possibility of Eddie getting a legit comeback beyond the news that would be garnered if he resurrected beyond his secret life as everyday construction worker... Also, during rehearsals, while Eddie insults his band into "getting it right", the glossy, recording-session-sounding music sounds exactly the same from beginning to end, so it's like trying to perfect music from a car commercial...
Also, gone is the mystique of the original's young perfect-looking Pare, seen through archive footage (without Tom Berenger in ANY shot)... and as he's supposed to have aged 20 years to fit the plot-line, the man himself looks like his own father, so the sex symbol playing rock star novelty that ignited the original is dead and gone...
However what's here is a lightweight video-rental, and EDDIE AND THE CRUISERS II: EDDIE'S BACK not only doesn't mind, but for the most part, revels in being just that.