Power Ballad review: An engaging but easily forgotten bromance film

Paul Weller, long considered a symbol of the cool end of the popular music spectrum, shocked his millions of fans in 2014 when news broke that he’d ventured into cheesy talent show terrain by writing a song with X Factor runner-up Olly Murs – an unlikely bedfellows collaboration too far for some.

The protagonists of Power Ballad are also musicians from differing worlds, albeit not so cut-and-dried; Paul Rudd’s Rick is a semi-veteran who came close to success with a ‘hip’ rock band (all jet-black eyeliner and outlaw comedian Bill Hicks T-shirts), while Nick Jonas’s Danny is the heartthrob boy band alumnus tentatively embarking on a solo career.

“I could tell within two minutes of meeting you that you’re not just some boy band guy,” the elder statesman tells the pin-up the first time they occupy the screen together, but the mutual appreciation society is, inevitably, given a severe test.

What initially brings them together before pulling them apart is a song, written by Rick and casually played to Danny when the former is fronting a band booked for a wedding where the latter is a guest. Months later, Rick is somewhat miffed to hear Danny singing it, piped through a cavernous shopping mall, and seemingly passing it off as one of his own compositions.

The scene is set for an age-old yarn of showbiz conflict with Rick pained and frustrated at Danny reaping the rewards of a hit that should be his, director and co-writer John Carney homing in on career trajectories going in opposite directions, but the narrative takes meandering detours into the healing power of popular song as the foundation for unexpected friendships.

It’s all perfectly serviceable as entertainment fables go, although the changes in tone can be awkward and credulity-stretching, with neither lead wholly convincing – Rudd’s default boyish charm makes Rick a fairly charismatic figure, but the manner in which his world goes off the rails as the story progresses is a tad broad and hammy.

“Having my name on that song would have changed my life!” he yells at one point, with all the despair and anger of motorist experiencing road rage on a suburban dual carriageway.

Jonas gives a solid performance of a more clearly defined character, even if he’s ultimately less interesting than Rudd’s, and where Carney scores points is in suggesting how both wrestle with creativity, aspiration and acceptance.

Carney has walked these roads before, music and the passions of the people who make it are at the heart of Once (2007), Begin Again (2013) and Sing Street (2016), and to a certain extent he’s remixing his greatest hits in Power Ballad, employing verses, choruses and singalong hooks as the emotional glue that helps viewers forgive the narrative lapses into sentimentality.

A robust soundtrack helps paper over some of the cracks in the screenplay, not least new songs written by Gary Clark, perhaps best known as the creative force behind 1980s hit makers Danny Wilson (a band who, curiously, share their name with Jonas’s character) and a string of more familiar, vintage numbers for Rudd to get his teeth into, including the Hall & Oates banger Maneater, and Kool & The Gang’s Celebration.

Those bygone chart-toppers serve a similar purpose to the Neil Diamond numbers in 2025’s Song Sung Blue, embellishing proceedings with a feel-good factor that can’t help but win audiences over and providing much needed punctuation at times when the storyline sputters more than it soars.

Shorn of its music, however, Power Ballad pivots between drama and comedy without ever staking a claim to be either; the subject matter could have been bitingly satirical, or a more focused cautionary tale, but instead settles into fuzzy-round-the-edges bromance which, while undeniably engaging, might struggle to stay in the memory once the closing credits have rolled.

Power Ballad is now showing in UK cinemas.

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