The Dirt is a 2019 bo-pic about the story of how Mötley Crüe came to be one of the most notorious rock ‘n roll groups in history.
For some reason, biographical movies about musicians is a thing. Hollywood has long tried to dramatize the lives of entertainers in movies about country singers, blues icons, rap legends, and most especially, rock stars. I get it of course. Fans want more of what they love and what’s better than peeking behind the curtain to see what motivated them to become who they are? With the success of hits like The Doors, Walk the Line, and more recently Bohemian Rhapsody flooding screens and Rocketman soon to come, there seems no end to the grinder.
Now comes Jeff Tremaine‘s The Dirt, a selected examination of the highly-influential metal band Mötley Crüe, now streaming on Netflix. It’s a decidedly raucous look at the four-member group, based on the book of the same name written by the band themselves, Nikki Sixx, Vince Neil, Tommy Lee, and Mick Mars, filled with all kind of debauchery and hard-rocking whatnots you’ve come to expect from the legendary band, whose infamous exploits filled pop news for more than a decade in the 80s and 90s.
The film takes on a kind of invitational approach, with each of the four leads often talking directly to the camera or narrating specific parts of the movie. To their credit, probably the best this about this movie is the cast with Douglas Booth as Sixx pretty much the main story, tracking his troubled childhood and being the creator of the band. Rapper and musician Machine Gun Kelly steps in as Lee, the stringy drummer seemingly just happy to be playing and partying. Iwan Rheon plays Mars, a dark and conflicted older member who comes to the party with some actual physical setbacks, and then there’s Daniel Webber as Neil, who is the most curious of the bunch. His performance is the most cartoonish of the lot in a movie that takes that definition to great heights, he sort of elevating the antics of the colorful frontman to exaggerated levels. Though maybe not. It’s made pretty clear that if anything, these boys did everything to excess.
There is a kind of detachment though that dims the lights a bit on this show, the film never all that convincing as if it’s trying hard to be a mock-documentary that pokes fun at the lifestyle while every once in a while tossing in some very real and emotional jagged edges. Rampant drug abuse is first on the list with some dire consequences that while true to its history seem rather conventional in how it plays out. Sex and myriad naked girls run the gambit as well, with an opening scene featuring explosive visible female ejaculation setting the tone for the film, though it never quite goes up to that sketchy line afterward. The message is as blunt as their (admitted great) music.
I am long time fan of the band, though not a fanatic, enjoying their hits and videos as much as anyone, but as with any band, even the ones I follow more closely, have little interest in their personal stories. Movies like this tend to (by nature of the limitations) paint with broad strokes and emphasize the deep valleys and high peaks without really giving the middle all that much depth. This is an earnest effort made with genuine devotion to the band’s history and as such, is a solid watch that might probably encourage those looking for more to dig a little deeper on their own.