| Movie DescriptionWill Burton (Gaelan Connell) is a music enthusiast and a David Bowie fan. Throughout the movie, Will writes journal-like e-mails to Bowie seeking approval of his music, although Bowie never answers. When Will's mother Karen (Lisa Kudrow) finds a new job, he switches to a new school, which he is eager to do since he was bullied at his previous one. During lunch one day at his new school, he meets a girl whose name is written Sa5m, but pronounced Sam (Vanessa Hudgens). She tells him about Bandslam, an annual music competition in which the winning band gets a recording contract. Will and Sa5m quickly become friends, but shortly after, he is sought after by another girl named Charlotte Barnes (Alyson Michalka). One afternoon, Charlotte asks Will to join her in an after-school day-care center. When she starts inviting him to hang out with her, the teenager is stunned—as is his single mother Karen. Impressed by his eclectic knowledge of music, Charlotte, who is a gifted singer-songwriter, asks Will to manage her rock/ska band. Her goal is apparently to take revenge on her egocentric musician ex-boyfriend Ben Wheatley (Scott Porter) during Bandslam.
Unsure of what he is getting himself into, Will agrees to help Charlotte's band (later called "I Can't Go On, I'll Go On") which includes Bug (Charlie Saxton) and Omar (Tim Jo), eventually expanding it with more like-minded outcasts. These include drummer Basher Martin, who first hesitates, but decides to join after Will tells he has an older sister who is often around (in fact this is Karen). Against all odds, the group's sound starts to come together and their prospects for success look bright. Even more surprising, Will starts losing his "loser-status". Once he gets committed in Charlotte's band, however, he is unable to complete a project he was going to do with Sa5m. After that, Sa5m starts ignoring Will at school. He visits her house one night, hoping to apologize. Her mom then shows him a video of a younger Sa5m performing "Everything I Own", but when Sa5m walks in, she is outraged and orders Will to leave. As an apology, he makes a short yet touching documentary about her for his Human Studies project and she eventually forgives him. |
