Almost Famous No Spoiler Review: On a Rewatch in My 40s, This Could Be Cameron Crowe's Best Film

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Almost Famous (2000) is a love letter to rock and roll and a mirror held up to it at the same time; on a rewatch in my 40s, it could be Cameron Crowe’s best film.

I remember seeing it when it came out, but I don’t think I saw it with the right goggles. I was a teenager, and all I was thinking about back then was whether the guy would get the girl, the girl being Kate Hudson. In fact, he didn’t get the girl.

Now that I’m in my 40s, my first reaction was that they don’t make bands like this anymore. They don’t make music like this anymore, even though this was a movie from 2000 about bands in the 1970s. As the movie goes on, you realize it is a love letter to music, to bands, to rock and roll, and to being a fan. At the same time, it puts a mirror in front of that fandom and that industry and shows it for what it really is. That works so well because it’s exactly what the lead character, played by Patrick Fugit, is doing too.

He is the best person to see the movie through, because what he sees is exactly what Crowe wants us to see, and we go on that journey with him. He’s the perfect lens. We see the band for who they are: first the good side, then the bad, and in the end it’s all just who we are as people. We are the good and the bad, the real and the fake.

Toward the end, it gets really good. Crowe really shines, particularly with the plane scene and everything that happens after it. I’ve talked recently about movies that don’t stick the landing. They either have a MacGuffin or somehow produce a cop-out. This is far from that. This movie is almost perfect (maybe it is perfect). It’s brilliant, and it wraps everything up in a bow.

Even the final scene was really, really well done, when Russell Hammond, the band’s guitarist played by Billy Crudup, shows up and meets the mom. When he knocked on the door, I looked at my wife and realized, “Oh, I know where he is.” She looked back at me, and we both just went, “Yeah.”

Of course, Kate Hudson was excellent. This was her claim to fame, the film that first put her on the scene, and after seeing it again, she is probably the best manic pixie dream girl, in every sense of the term. She was literally a muse, and not to just one of them. She had different kinds of men, or boys, around her, and even in the end, when she brought them together, she was the one controlling them.

It was funny to see Zooey Deschanel before the bangs. Her acting wasn’t that good here, but maybe she’s just funnier now.

Frances McDormand’s mom is a great character. She’s annoying, but you still love her, and you can see the dynamics between her and her children. Even knowing her kid is out on the road, she lets him be, because she learned her lesson with the daughter. She’s trying, but she’s hard to break. I think about my mom, because my mom is like that. That’s just how moms are, at least in my eyes: they try, but they can’t help themselves. That is a great, great characterization of a mom. It’s a little bit annoying that this role came after Fargo (1996), because that is probably her best role, and she deserves more. We’re looking at watching Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017) next.

I don’t know what Patrick Fugit is doing now. He was really good in this movie and played it really well. I could relate to him as a 15-year-old when I was 18, and I could still relate to him as a 15-year-old at 40. He was the lens you saw everything through, and it was very effective.

Jason Lee turns in another solid supporting role in a Cameron Crowe movie. Philip Seymour Hoffman was excellent, as always: real, raw, and pleasant.

There’s a scene where Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup) is on the roof of a house, high on acid. I couldn’t help but think that this is what cellphones have stolen from us: moments that happen and then live only in memory and oral tradition. You wouldn’t believe it happened, and the story would last precisely because you couldn’t confirm or deny it. That’s literally how legends are born.

This film is why I once put Cameron Crowe in my top five directors. To be honest, he has since dropped off that list, but watching this, my wife is right: this could be his best film. I think I’m going to rewatch all the Cameron Crowe movies from my youth. I already rewatched Vanilla Sky (2001) last week to look at it through the eyes of an adult.

I watched some interviews with Crowe after our viewing, and I realized why he dropped off my list: he wasn’t able to keep it up. He made a splash as the writer of Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), and I think some people will say that’s his best film. Then he made ANOTHER cult classic with Say Anything… (1989), his first as director, and then Singles (1992), which is really underrated and still one of my favorite movies. Then came one after another: Jerry Maguire (1996), Almost Famous, and Vanilla Sky. And then that was it. I personally love Elizabethtown (2005), but it wasn’t received so well. We Bought a Zoo (2011) and Aloha (2015) are just okay.

In those interviews, I found out that Almost Famous is loosely based on his own life. He really was a teenage writer for Rolling Stone. He really hung out with rock stars. He lived that life. “It’s all happening,” which gets quoted a lot in the film, is something he heard from someone in real life. The mom is based on his real mom, and Lester Bangs, the character Philip Seymour Hoffman plays, was a real person in his life.

When I learned all of this, part of me wondered: if it’s based on reality, if it’s not an original story, does that take away from the quality of the script? My gut says no. Then again, people advise, “Write what you know.” Speaking of which, I think I need to rewatch Orange County (2002) with my 40-year-old lens. Some critics would say that he wrote what he knew, and then that was it. He had great stories, but he has told all of them. Do I believe that? I think about it, and I’m giving it consideration, but I will give him the benefit of the doubt.

Does his longevity even matter? Even if he doesn’t make them like he used to, people have changed too, and so has the zeitgeist. And come on, his filmography speaks for itself. I’m not sure he gets his seat back in my top five directors of all time, but he will always be one of the GOATs for me. He will always be revered.

This film is so quintessentially Cameron Crowe. This is what he does: all of these little stories, characters, interactions, and dialogue, and the music, of course. You live through the film. It’s really amazing, and I’m really happy we got to rewatch it.

★★★★★ with a heart, for both of us.

You can follow what else we’ve been watching on Letterboxd.