Smalltown USA, 1947: Over the summer, singer, songwriter and sax-player Giff (Curran Barker) has formed a swing sextet with his friends Nolan (Kyle DeCamp), Conrad (Jeremy Lee Staple), Elliott (Christopher Pollack), Kenny (Brandon Ruiter) and Duke (Greg Sadler), but now that it's back to school, they want to take it to the next level and launch a big band, and surprisingly enough, they meet very little resistance from their school as the principal Mr. Arthur (Emilio Palame) is a jazz head and their class teacher Mr. Miller (Richard Neil) has a past in leading big bands and has learned from arguably the greatest, his late brother Glenn Miller. And soon enough they assemble a really great orchestra and seem to be unstoppable - until they refuse to accept moderately talented young Carol (Halston Autumn McMurray) as their lead singer, upon which her mother, Mrs Barlutski (Amanda Lamberti), threatens to raise hell, especially since the band also has a coloured member, Conrad. She soon has the school inspector, Tanner (Randy Irwin), on her side, and also Giff's brother Wesley (Trevor Brunsink), a PTSD-struck World War II veteran, and even the band's lead trumpeteer, Elliott. And they try everything to stop the band, from chasing them off the school grounds to stealing their music sheets, from cutting off their funding to tampering with the band's insurance for going on field trips - like the all-important Battle of the Bands. The band, christened Knights of Swing, soldiers through all of this admirably, but how much will it take to finally break them?

Now one thing, you pretty much need to like swing music to enjoy this movie as most of the film's 150 minute running time is accompanied by swing tunes - but it's really above all the music that makes this movie, as despite it clearly being old school jazz arranged in an overall traditional way, the music does feel very fresh - and that's not only because most of the pieces were composed especially for the film but also because the musicians involved very obviously had fun playing it and put their focus on enjoyability and groove rather than utter authenticity. Also the film comes into its own especially in the musical performances that are filmed by people who very obviously love music in general and jazz in particular. Storywise, I have to admit the film definitely has its heart in the right place, but also is a bit of a tearjerker that uses a few too many clichées to wholly convince - but once yet another jazzy tune sets in, all this is quickly forgotten and one can't help but tap one's foot time and again when watching this.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

Feeling lucky ? Want to search any of my partnershops yourself for more, better results ?

The links below will take you just there !!!

Find Knights of Swing at the amazons ...   amazon.com   amazon.co.uk   amazon.de Looking for imports ? Find Knights of Swing here ...   eThaiCD.com Your shop for all things Thai Something naughty ? (Must be over 18 to go there !)   find Knights of Swing at adultvideouniverse.com

Thanks for watching !!!