Daydream Believers: The Monkees' Story (2000)

Too much of everything

One of my all time favorites.

hyped garbage

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

I thought that this movie was one of the best made Biopics in that it captured The Monkees perfectly. The likenesses were staggering and although Aaron Lohr is not a spot on likeness for Micky Dolenz (and who could be?) he captures his facial expressions and mannerisms so well that he does a really good portrayal of him. The story although not 100% accurate is close enough and you can forgive the little changes that are made for the sake of moving the story forward.What was really good was the way it showed their naive enthusiasm on to their becoming very credible musicians themselves and on to the frustrations they faced. Jef Geddis as Mike Nesmith did this particularly well. All to often when Biopics are made the actors likeness to the star they are portraying is overlooked, (The exception being such films as Ray where Jamie Foxx became Ray Charles perfectly) but not so in this film. Even L.B Fisher as Peter Tork and George Stanchev as Davey Jones are really good.So I would recommend this movie to any Monkees fan or anyone who enjoys similar types of film. Thoroughly entertaining throughout.

Daydream Believers: The Monkees' Story is a big disappointment because the story of The Monkees has such great potential and could have made for a great film. This unfortunately, is not a great film. In a way, the project was doomed from the get-go simply for being a made-for-TV movie. The Monkees story isn't one that can be told in a PG-rated way, and unfortunately those were the standards that had to be met.First off, the casting seemed to make the unfortunate decision of choosing the four lead actors who portray the Monkees, more for their physical appearances than anything else. All four actors resemble their Monkey counterparts fairly well, but their performances were all over-the-top and leaned dangerously into the areas of caricature. Micky was "the zany one", Mike "the controlling one", Peter "the zen one" and Davy "the easy-going one". The reduction of The Monkees to these one-dimensional characters makes the main characters difficult to relate to, and hard to believe. It would have been much nicer to see all four portrayed as fully fleshed out human-beings. The actor who plays Peter was probably the best in my opinion, while the actor who played Davy did at least seem to take some time to get Davy Jones's mannerisms down fairly well, most especially when playing the tambourine. All in all though, it was difficult to see them as The Monkees and not as four actors doing poor imitations of The Monkees. Aaron Lohr's "Micky Dolenz doing James Cagney" was particularly cringe-worthy.Also a great deal of screen-time was wasted with this film by recreating full music videos or scenes from the show. This wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing, but accuracy was not taken into account when filming these recreations. They appeared to try to make the "Daydream Believer" video fairly close to the original in terms of choreography, but goofed on the wardrobe by outfitting the boys in the clothing worn in the "Star Collector" video. They also attempted to recreate the Monkees opening sequence, but mixed up scenes from the first season opener with the second season opener. Since these bits took up a good portion of the film, you think they'd have taken the care to at least recreate them accurately.Many of the more scandalous bits of Monkey history (Michael Nesmith's affair and the resulting illegitimate child, most notably) were left out entirely to paint a much cleaner picture than what existed in reality. In addition, many facts were fudged, changed, or outright left out in order to make this film more of a happy-go-lucky affair than the real tell-all expose that it could have been.All-in-all, it's a shame that the first attempt at bringing the lives of The Monkees to the screen resulted in such a mediocre piece. Hopefully someday a bigger studio, with more funds and more time, can do justice in telling the real story of the Pre-fab Four we know and love.

Imagine {Sorry about the pun } a Beatles movie without a reference or mention of George Martin or Pete BestWell this movie totally ignores the Monkees two biggest behind the scene starsJeff Barry and Neil DiamondThe Monkees would of not been the World famous Monkees without themHelloAnyone heard of "I'm A Believer" , "A little Bit Me ,A little bit You' and " LOok out , Here comes tomorrow"Gee without these classics, the Monkees would never taken off!

Ok, here goes--I am a Monkee fan from way back--from when the original series was on TV. (Telling my age now, huh?) I was prepared to hate this movie because movies of this type never really seem to "hit the mark" and do justice. I must say I was pleasantly surprised. Although I realise that it was not a "perfect" movie AND that the script could have possibly been better, AND that there wasn't nearly enough "Monkee Music", I almost forgot that these guys were not the "Monkees". I think the actors did a great job, especially Aaron (Micky)--great job on the lip-synching close-ups. (Hey, it's hard to make it look like you're REALLY singing the lyrics--especially close-up!) Maybe my hearing isn't what it used to be but I thought George (Davy) did great on the accent (but lose the wig!). L.B. (Peter) reminded me of a blonde Keanu Reeves from Bill and Ted (they oughta get him if they ever need a guy to play Keanu's brother). Jeff (Mike) was the Monkee you loved to hate--hey, Mike was never my favorite anyway. Got a real kick out of his portrayal as the blonde princess though!! As for the casting people getting look-a-like actors, I think they did a good job. If you wanted better or exact ones, we'd have to "clone" them--hey, there's an idea--Ha! I learned a lot about these guys that I didn't know. I agree that the opening scenes (modern day) were really DUMB--I almost thought I had rented the wrong movie at first. Out of a possible 10, I'd give this one an 8!!!