THE COMMITMENTS (1991) **1/2 Watching a young band go from rags to riches and/or reverse usually makes for a good story, but there are already so many of them out there, with real people and so much more worth caring about. The onus is on the storyteller to say something new or at least brilliantly, but none of that happens here. It's entertaining enough, and they may think that they're doing us a favor by reminding us of mid-20th century soul music. If you were already into they won't do anything more than pleasantly remind you of something that once was original and if you weren't already into it you'll probably discard it as flavor of the month after a little while. Would have probably made more sense to make a biopic on Wilson Pickett or Al Green or one of those guys. I don't mean to sound so negative, it's a talented (but derivative to the point of being nothing else, save, I guess, Irish) band and they'd be fun to catch in a club (more so than a movie theater). Robert Arkins is a good singer, and Angeline Ball is as close to Motown girls incarnate as a white girl 25 years after the fact is gonna get. There are traces of Diana Ross in her movements and insinuations, and that's no insult. The great artistic denouement isn't all for naught, but it's something that humans, much less artists, shouldn't have to be reminded of.
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