Product Description

Academy Award(R)-winner Gwyneth Paltrow (Best Actress, SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE, THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY) and Scott Speedman (TV's FELICITY) are part of the stellar ensemble cast in a hilariously offbeat comedy! The lives of six stranges become outrageously intertwined when a riotous road trip culminates at the site of the national Karaoke championships. As they compete for the $5,000 grand prize, this unlikely group will eventually learn all about each other ... while discovering answers to the questions about themselves! Also featuring great performances from Maria Bello (COYOTE UGLY), Andre Braugher (FREQUENCY), Paul Giamatti (BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE), and Huey Lewis (SHADOW OF DOUBT) -- you'll agree with audiences everywhere who fell in love with this uncommonly entertaining comedy!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9176 in DVD
• Brand: Disney
• Released on: 2001-05-08
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 112 minutes

Amazon.com
Karaoke is a way for average people to get on stage and sing cover songs. In Duets, it's also a money sport. No, really. As with other bar sports (pool, darts), the karaoke-for-money game is rife with hustlers. One such hustler is Ricky Dean (Huey Lewis), who takes time off the karaoke circuit to attend the funeral of his ex-wife, where he meets his estranged daughter (Gwyneth Paltrow) and can't shake her desire to go on the road with him. The other hustler is Suzi Loomis (Maria Bello), a woman who literally prostitutes herself to get from gig to gig, until she meets up with a kind-hearted cabby (Scott Speedman). Then there's Todd Woods (Paul Giamatti), who gets so fed up with his sales job and being ignored at home that he hits the road, moving from karaoke bar to karaoke bar in a voyage of self-discovery. Along the way he picks up Reggie Kane (Andre Braugher), an escaped felon with a voice like an angel. All three couples end up in Omaha for the $5,000 karaoke finals. Chock full of bad writing and bad direction, the movie inspires a perverse fascination. Braugher and Giamatti chew up the scenery at every opportunity, but most interesting is the father-daughter incest subtext (compounded by the fact that the movie is directed by Gwyneth's dad, Bruce Paltrow). Eeeeesh. --Andy Spletzer

Customer Reviews

Go Ahead and Laugh
"Duets" stars Gwyneth Paltrow and Huey Lewis as daughter-and-father karaoke singers.

Go ahead and laugh. Why not? Everyone else does. There's something about karaoke that draws titters. Sure, it's increasingly popular, this singing along to backing tracks, with shows like "Say What! Karaoke" on MTV sending young wannabes into karaoke bars everywhere. But karaoke (Japanese for "empty orchestra"-I guess the singer is supposed to fill the void) is still perceived as something silly that people do when they've had a few too many.

So here's the surprise: "Duets" likes karaoke. In the movie, it's a metaphor for lost souls finding themselves, and, in their conquering a song, an audience, or a competition, filling some kind of spiritual void.

Paltrow, the Oscar-winning actress for "Shakespeare in Love," is the daughter of director Bruce Paltrow, and she comes off as exactly that: a good little girl, more giddy than we've seen her in a while; seeking a reconnection with her father (Lewis), a rock singer reduced to hustling bets at karaoke bars.

Everybody knows that Lewis can sing. But so can Gwyneth, with a shimmering, glistening voice, which she shows off on Jackie DeShannon's "Bette Davis Eyes" and in a duet with Lewis, on Smokey Robinson's "Cruisin'."

And so can Paul Giamatti, best known for his role as "Pig Vomit," the hated radio executive in Howard Stern's film, "Private Parts." A supposed karaoke virgin when he hits a bar, by chance, as he reels out of a dead-end routine as a traveling salesman, he nails Todd Rundgren's "Hello It's Me" and is hooked on singing. (Ah, Hollywood. Competing for a $5,000 prize, Lewis surprises Paltrow by calling her onto the stage, where they do an unreheased "Cruisin'" - perfectly, natch. And Giamatti, along with an ex-con hitchhiker played by Andre Braugher, whip up a stunning version of "Try a Little Tenderness," even though Braugher is on the lam and not exactly pleased to have been dragged onto a spotlit stage.)

Braugher actually doesn't sing; his voice is dubbed in. Neither does Scott Speedman, who plays a cab driver. But his pickup, Suzi (Maria Bello, from "Coyote Ugly") does, and acquits herself well on "Sweet Dreams" and "I Can't Make You Love Me."

Bruce Paltrow does toss in a couple of clinkers, but only briefly, and in the background. Curiously, he doesn't employ any Asian singers in any of the half-dozen or so bars in the movie. Karaoke was invented in Japan, became popular in various Asian cities, and has turned the stereotype of Asians as shy non-performers on its head. But you won't find any evidence of this evolution in "Duets."

Nor will you find much original. You've got yer hesitant parent and kid reunion; yer (black) con on the run hooking up with yer burned-out (white) guy making his own kind of escape. Then there's the cabbie who's just lost his girlfriend, and he just happens into the sexy Suzi, a small-town singer with stars in her eyes; she's itching to go to California. So call it three road movies squished into one, with the three pairs, such as they are, converging at a karaoke contest in Omaha.

See? You laughed again. But that's OK. "Duets" may be a bad movie, but it's the kind of bad that you can enjoy. As the New York Times' A.O. Scott wrote, "We could use more bad movies like this."

Underrated
I thought this movie was wonderful and am surprised at the vitriolic critiques by reviewers. Gwynneth is always a great actress and she played the part of the daughter reunited with a reluctant father well. There were several subplots in this move, all involving wonderful singing and complex relationships.

Don't believe the critics on this one. It actually is an enjoyable movie, which is in turns funny, sweet and sad.

Well worth seeing
Discovering this movie was a happy accident. I had heard the Gwyneth Paltrow/Huey Lewis duet "Crusin'" on the radio and tracked down the movie. It did not get much press, I don't think. I found it very enjoyable, and in watching the extras on the DVD, discovered that all the actors did their own singing with the exception of Andre Braugher. He and the character he pairs up with have the most memorable scenes in my opinion. Braugher is an excellent actor. When I tell people this movie is about karyoke they never want to see it. If I can convince them to watch it anyway, they are always glad they did. It is not really about karyoke anyway, it is about relationships, using karyoke as a backdrop. Discovering Gwyneth Paltrow's singing ability was an extra benefit. This is sort of a "feel good" movie, but it has serious moments as well. And some great comedy scenes thrown in as well. I fell in love with the movie and the soundtrack.