Spinal Tap II: The End Continues Parent Guide

Forty years after he brought hair metal band Spinal Tap to the big screen in a groundbreaking Technicolor documentary, director Martin Di Bergi (Rob Reiner) is back for more. Unbeknownst to the band, their former agent has died and left their contract to his daughter, which stipulates that they owe one more concert. The members fell out years ago, but they don’t really have a choice about this reunion gig. Guitarist Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest) is running a cheese shop in Berwick-upon-Tweed, singer David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean) has taken to composing background music for phone holds and true-crime podcasts, and bassist Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer) has established a museum dedicated to glue. But for one night only, they will again, by contractual obligation, have to be…Spinal Tap.

I’ll confess off the bat that I haven’t seen the original film. Sorry, I wasn’t alive when it came out, and I never got around to it. It’s hard to escape some cultural awareness of the film, though, and I’m familiar with the plot and some of the bigger gags thanks to second-hand exposure. All I can say is I hope it was better than the sequel. The movie isn’t actively bad – it has its moments, and the cast are clearly having fun, but it never really seems to have any energy. I can’t tell if the irony is deliberate, but this aging-rock-star-mockumentary feels very much on its last legs.

The rock-and-roll setting led me to expect that I would spend a lot of time scribbling in my notebook, but the film doesn’t actually have that much negative content. Surprisingly, the biggest issue is the profanity, with 17 f-bombs, but other profanity is minimal. There are some sexually crude references in many of the songs, and one incredibly brief reference to non-specific “drugs”, and that’s just about it.

The film pulls up some impressive cameos – Sirs Paul McCartney and Elton John, to name two – but the film is really saved by the bell in the form of an 83-minute runtime. That’s a pretty short welcome to wear out, but I found it getting close. I suspect I’m just not the target audience, but since I was completely alone in the theatre, I didn’t even have the benefit of anyone else’s laughter, or lack thereof. If you’re a fan, you’ll have to roll the dice.

About author

Keith Hawkes

Keith Hawkes graduated from Mount Royal University, Calgary, Canada with a degree in English and History. His interests are movies, American literature, science fiction, almost every kind of music, and museums. He enjoys criticizing films for fun - although he's okay with being paid for it.