Movie review 'Rock The Kasbah': It’s springtime for Kabul

Richie Lanz (Bill Murray, Groundhog Day) is a music agent, stuck representing low-end clients with zero talent until he gets a better than usual gig: a USO tour for his client Ronnie (Zooey Deschanel). The problem is that this show is in Afghanistan. Lanz and Ronnie arrive at the war-torn nation crawling with shady characters: Bombay Brian (Bruce Willis), Daoud the taxi-driver (Beejan Land), the prostitute Merci (Kate Hudson). Things go bad and Richie ends up stranded, without passport and money. After a series of mishaps he launches a crazy scheme: a chance to launch an Afghani pop sensation, Salima (Leem Lubany), the daughter of a traditional Pashtun village chief. Lanz must somehow use his American wheeler-dealing to undo decades of traditions in time for the finale.

Who is the target audience? Does the movie know what it’s trying to do and say? These are essential questions to ask before making any movie. Rock the Kasbah is confusing on all three counts. The story and situation we can recognise. Murray plays a Broadway Danny Rose-like scrapper who chases success only to trip at the finishing line, and he’s humiliating and wasting himself into middle age. The question is what possible reason is there to send this kind of story and situation, quintessentially American, to Afghanistan during the war on terror?

Then there’s Murray and prima donna musician, Ronnie, stranded in a new land; your basic tourist nightmare comedy. The other genre and settings we can recognise as Hollywood cliché. The Rick Blaine’s café milieu of shady arms dealers, call girls and borders criss-crossing as deals and counter-deals get made. This brings to an unconvincing romance with Kate Hudson. We also have Bruce Willis as a tough guy who does not do a great deal. Then Salima, played by Palestinian actress Leem Lubany, appears and it becomes the kind of well-intentioned social message/sports movie that is generally poor film-making.

The title Rock the Kasbah comes from the song of the same name by the rock band, The Clash. As it is helpfully clarified at the start, Bill Murray’s Lanz is mistaking North Africa for Afghanistan. Yet, the idea of waving a hand towards America’s shallow perceptions towards West Asia and Afghanistan is not enough when the film fundamentally uses and rests on those same misconceptions. It amounts, at best, to a pre-emptive apology. Bruce Willis steals all his scenes and is fun to watch. But it ultimately goes everywhere and nowhere. The writer is programmer, Lightcube Film Society