Let me start with this: the movie is NOT, nor was it ever intended to be an SLN skit. I've seen a lot of reviews around the net comparing it to their digital shorts, but it's a huge mistake and if you went to the cinema expecting an extended digital short, you have only yourself to blame for the disappointment. Another type of complaint is that it's not critical enough of the pop industry, but it's also a false expectation, it was never intended to do that. If you know The Lonely Island even a little bit, you have to know that they are true fans of the music industry in general and they don't drag people. Hell, Andy didn't do it when he was supposed to, just watch his roast of James Franco. He said he wasn't comfortable with insulting people and Akiva and Jorma share this sentiment. As Kiv said in an interview: they don't throw shade, they throw sunshine.
So now that I cleared up that what this movie isn't, let's see what it is. It's a fake pop documentary about popstar Conner4Real, played by Andy Samberg. It's fake in the sense that obviously Conner is not a real person and the shenanigans he gets into are over the top TLI style, but other than that it's an actual documentary with famous people commenting on the events every so often. I don't want to spoil anything so I'm gonna be vague: the boys make fun of the ridiculous situations and circumstances that goes with being someone in the center of a lot of people's attention, they point out the absurdity in the popstar lifestyle, but that's only the comedy aspect of the movie. Underneath that, this movie is about a lovable, sometimes childishly oblivious and out of thouch with reality kinda guy, who never had a normal life, so he doesn't know how to deal with it when things don't go his way and we follow his journey to learn and grow as a person. Conner may be a fictional character, but he's not a caricature, neither is anyone else in the movie. The characters might be a bit over the top sometimes which provides the comedy elements in the movie, but the friendship between Conner (Andy), Owen (Jorma) and Lawrence (Akiva) is real and touching and THAT's what this movie is about. While obviously it's a comedy, there are a few real, emotional moments in there that made me tear up. I won't tell about the story more, but I have to mention the music briefly: the songs are amazing (though I'm not a big fan of Hunter's bits) and Conner performing "Finest girl" on stage is just hot damn!
In conclusion: I really liked the movie, I think the boys have every right to be proud of it, and if you don't go into this with false expectations you'll enjoy it very much too! Mark my words: it's gonna be cult classic!
