Film review: Song One - insipid and self-indulgent

SONG ONE
Starring: Anne Hathaway, Johnny Flynn
Director: Kate Barker-Froyland
Category: IIA

Set in a sanitised version of Brooklyn's already squeaky-clean folk scene, Song One revolves around Franny (Anne Hathaway), an anthropology doctoral student whose aspiring musician brother Henry (Ben Rosenfield) sinks into a coma after being hit by a car. Franny searches out Henry's favourite folk singer James Forester (Johnny Flynn), and the two start a friendship as they sit by her ailing brother's bedside. Meanwhile Franny's writer mum Karen (Mary Steeburgen) faffs around, hoping the pair will get together.

So little happens in the self-indulgent drama that it seems like first-time feature film scriptwriter-director Barker-Froyland had the idea for the set-up, but didn't know how to develop it. Leading man Flynn, who has the winsome charisma necessary for a successful folkie, wanders around looking worried most of the time, whereas Hathaway (pictured left with Flynn) goes for misery.

An inkling of a plot revolves around Franny finding a song that her brother had written before the crash. When Forester whips out his guitar at Henry's bedside, it's no surprise what happens next. But if music really were that powerful, the entire medical profession would be out of a job.

In lieu of a proper storyline, viewers are taken on a trawl of Brooklyn music clubs, showcasing some dreadful strummers who deserve to be beaten around the head with their guitars and sent home to mummy. The best that can be said for Song One is that most of the musicians are actually playing their instruments.