When "Joliet" Jake Blues (John Belushi) is released from prison, his brother Elwood (Dan Aykroyd) collects him to go and visit the Mother Superior (Kathleen Freeman), called "The Penguin," of the orphanage where they were raised in Chicago. While giving them a hell of a whacking due to their obscene language and rebellious attitudes, she tells them it's closing down because it's five grand in debt and the Church has discontinued funding the place. It has just eleven days left to gather the cash, but that gives the boys an idea: reform their blues band and stage a massive show! But that proves far easier said than done, because their former bandmates have all either settled down or abandoned music altogether. But Jake and Elwood are committed to reeling them back in, even if that's just where their problems will start. They claim to be on a mission from God, but in order to fulfil it they'll have to endure the angry wrath of Chicago police, a local neo-Nazi branch, touring country band the Good Ol' Boys, and a vindictive mystery woman (the late Carrie Fisher, hysterical as the polar opposite of Princess Leia) among others...
Iconic US film critic Roger Ebert called The Blues Brothers "the Sherman tank of movie musicals," and that just about encapsulates it. Based on Aykroyd and Belushi's original Saturday Night Live sketch, John Landis' riotous stick of cult dynamite is as relentlessly anarchic and immediate as cinema comes. Upon release in 1980 it critically and commercially tanked (sorry, I couldn't resist) and in the latter sense I can see why, as Universal may not have known how to market it (as a musical, a comedy, an action film or a buddy chase film). But rather like The Rocky Horror Picture Show five years earlier, The Blues Brothers gradually found its niche through midnight screenings and thanks largely to them, the rental sales rose and rose before it finally returned a profit and deservedly acquired some mainstream popularity. Titbits about it have now permeated common pop culture trivia: which world record did it once hold? For the most cars crashed in a movie. Which singers respectively ran the restaurant, owned the music store, preached to the church congregation and performed on stage with the boys? Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, James Brown and Cab Calloway. How many film directors are seen in it? Four: Aykroyd, Landis (as a cop in the mall chase scene), Frank Oz (as one of Jake's corrections officers) and Steven Spielberg (the accountant at the end). Which supermodel is the chic girl who helps Jake and Elwood with a ride? Twiggy. Who encourages them to consult Reverend James? John Lee Hooker. What kind of music do they have at Bob's Country Bunker? "We got both kinds, we got country and western!" And who completes their band? Steve Cropper, Duck Dunn, Murphy Dunne, Willie Hall, Tom Malone, Lou Marini, Matt "Guitar" Murphy" and Alan "The food here is really expensive. The soup is fucking ten dollars!" Rubin.
Iconic US film critic Roger Ebert called The Blues Brothers "the Sherman tank of movie musicals," and that just about encapsulates it. Based on Aykroyd and Belushi's original Saturday Night Live sketch, John Landis' riotous stick of cult dynamite is as relentlessly anarchic and immediate as cinema comes. Upon release in 1980 it critically and commercially tanked (sorry, I couldn't resist) and in the latter sense I can see why, as Universal may not have known how to market it (as a musical, a comedy, an action film or a buddy chase film). But rather like The Rocky Horror Picture Show five years earlier, The Blues Brothers gradually found its niche through midnight screenings and thanks largely to them, the rental sales rose and rose before it finally returned a profit and deservedly acquired some mainstream popularity. Titbits about it have now permeated common pop culture trivia: which world record did it once hold? For the most cars crashed in a movie. Which singers respectively ran the restaurant, owned the music store, preached to the church congregation and performed on stage with the boys? Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, James Brown and Cab Calloway. How many film directors are seen in it? Four: Aykroyd, Landis (as a cop in the mall chase scene), Frank Oz (as one of Jake's corrections officers) and Steven Spielberg (the accountant at the end). Which supermodel is the chic girl who helps Jake and Elwood with a ride? Twiggy. Who encourages them to consult Reverend James? John Lee Hooker. What kind of music do they have at Bob's Country Bunker? "We got both kinds, we got country and western!" And who completes their band? Steve Cropper, Duck Dunn, Murphy Dunne, Willie Hall, Tom Malone, Lou Marini, Matt "Guitar" Murphy" and Alan "The food here is really expensive. The soup is fucking ten dollars!" Rubin.
Beyond the dynamic musical sequences and consistent laughs, though, are surely those utterly incendiary car chases. Landis just handles them with the exuberance of a kid playing a new video game for the first time, and the work of cinematographer Stephen M. Katz and editor George Falsey Jr. makes their pacing and rhythm sharp enough to cut through a block of timber. I firmly think the climactic car chase is the greatest one ever filmed. And throughout, the whole cast appear to be having the absolute time of their lives. All in all, The Blues Brothers is a timelessly entertaining firecracker of a movie.
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