The movie captures the story of the 'Oneders' band in Pennsylvania, who made a big fuss after the drummer broke his arm. Things seemed to change after this guy as he was replaced by jazz musician, Guy Patterson, who injected something somewhat differently into that different music.
First-time writer/director Tom Hanks stays about a half-beat ahead of the cliches with rim shots of boyish enthusiasm and deft comedy. The movie's also buoyed by the title song, whose Beatles sound is infectious enough to merit a real hit.
Though Hanks keeps the satirical and critical aspects of this look at show biz fairly light, there's a lot of conviction and savvy behind the steadiness of his gaze.
A sweet, likeable tale of the quick rise to fame and then demise of a small town band. Set in 1964, Hanks' film offers a sanitized, Gump-ish look at a mythical period when boys were boys and girls were girls, with no references to the sex-drug subculture
Time Out
June 24, 2006
Sweet nothing, then, but what would you expect of a rock movie devoted to the drummer?
Whereas Dances With Wolves was an epic cultural tract, That Thing You Do! is a piece of entertaining bubblegum which, like its director, making his feature directorial debut, is high on charm and style.
The chief wonder of this rock 'n' roll cast is Tom Everett Scott, whose easy charisma, dreamy smile and undersurface intelligence should shoot him up the acting charts like a bullet.
