The 2013 film, Grace Unplugged, is about Grace Trey (AJ Michalka) and her father, Johnny Trey (James Denton). Back in the 80s, Johnny was a rock star who had one hit song and then basically wasted away with his career with drugs and alcohol. Eventually, he got clean and turned his back on rock stardom. Instead, he started writing and performing faith-based music. Like her father, Grace is musically talented but, at the age of 18, she is chafing at the idea of living under his strict rules. Though she plays in his band, she resents the fact that he won’t left her play the songs the way that she wants to.
One day, Johnny is visited by his former manager, Mossy Mostin (Kevin Pollack). (Never trust anyone named Mossy.) Mossy explains that, because it was performed by the winner of an Australian singing competition, Johnny’s one hit is suddenly popular again. Mossy wants Johnny to start recording again. “None of the religious stuff, obviously,” Mossy says. Johnny turns Mossy down but Grace, looking for an escape, records her own version of her father’s song and sends it to Mossy.
After she ditches youth group so that she can go to a movie and subsequently gets yelled at about it by her father, Grace decides to leave home and go to Mossy. Mossy offers to manage Grace. He also tells Grace that he will be totally taking over her image. Soon, Grace finds herself in a phony relationship with a vapid television star (Zane Holtz) and she’s told that she has to be willing to sex up her image if she’s going to be a star. Johnny continually asks her to come back home. Mossy continually pressures her to stop thinking and just listen to her management.
On the positive side, Grace Unplugged avoids the many of the cliches that one might normally expect to come along with a film like this. Grace, for instance, doesn’t get hooked on pills or any other drugs. At worse, she has too much to drink one night and then wakes up with a bad hangover. Grace may often feel confused about what she wants to do with her career and she doesn’t appreciate her father’s strict ways but she never becomes self-destructive or strung out or any of the other things that usually happen in movies like this. As well, Mossy is portrayed as being a bit insensitive but he’s not some sort of a mustache-twirling villain. In fact, the film is smart enough to understand that Grace does have a point about her father. Johnny is too over-protective and over-controlling, especially when it comes to her music. He fears that she’ll make the same mistakes that he did but the viewers never have any doubt that she’s not going to. Grace is often naïve and unsure of what she should do but she’s never portrayed as being weak and I appreciated that.
That said, the film ends on a bit of a heavy-handed note as it reveals itself to be yet another adaptation of the parable of the Prodigal Son. The film’s script conspires to only leave Grace with two options, which is either abandon her family or abandon stardom. In the end, the film’s conclusion feels just a little bit too simplistic.
Through the Shattered Lens 