Film review – Simple Plan: The Kids In The Crowd

In the opening moments of The Kids In The Crowd, the camera descends a flight of stairs into a basement, the sound of familiar music growing louder. We see the members of Simple Plan, back in 2002, rehearsing together. “Why do you need to practice?” a voice behind the camera asks. “Because we suck,” singer Pierre Bouvier replies.

That declaration, as any Simple Plan fan will tell you, is patently untrue. But while fandom is subjective, what’s inarguable watching this feature-length documentary is that the Montreal pop-punks are bound by an insane work ethic. What’s more, they’re rarely given credit for how easy they make their enterprise appear (their last album, released in 2022, is called Harder Than It Looks, after all).

Cutting between the band’s humble past and confetti-strewn montages of the huge venues they command today, and with some familiar talking heads (Mark Hoppus, Fat Mike), The Kids In The Crowd is as wholesome as you’d expect from a film where one of its subjects buys the director poutine.

Things remain pretty squeaky clean throughout, the odd mention of late nights and some nudie mags notwithstanding. We learn that Reset, the outfit that pre-dated Simple Plan, started out in drummer Chuck Comeau’s parents’ basement, having been encouraged to become a band by a teacher, as a way to enter the school talent show. Mötley Crüe, this ain’t – though the story of Pierre ousting Chuck from Reset is pretty brutal stuff.

Simple Plan began when Chuck joined forces with guitarists Jeff Stinco and Sébastien Lefebvre, before Chuck reconnected with Pierre after two years of estrangement at a Sugar Ray concert. The rest, as they say, is history. And it’s a history littered with lovely moments, such as the hastily arranged show to ensnare the interest of Andy Karp from Atlantic Records, complete with friends plied with booze and lyrics read from hymn sheets to simulate dedicated fandom; and it worked – Karp signed Simple Plan, as a tearful Chuck recalls. “It worked because it was coming from our hearts,” suggests the earnest drummer who quit law school for the musical life, much to the consternation of his parents.

The Kids In The Crowd follows many familiar tropes, from the bonhomie and bickering of brotherhood, to the eternal struggle between credibility and commercial glory. For Simple Plan, airplay on rock radio was always the dream, though the film asks us to believe that they were torn about accepting a support slot with Avril Lavigne playing to 25,000 people each night for that reason, which rather stretches credulity. Thankfully, despite being considered ‘GGBB’ (Good Guys, Bad Band) by some, Simple Plan managed to have their cake and eat it, enjoying success on all fronts – including as early beneficiaries of the TikTok boom, thanks to the ‘I’m Just A Kid’ challenge, named after one of their most popular songs, in which people recreate old pictures of themselves.

Interestingly, the band’s lean into social media is spearheaded by Chuck, whose characteristic dedication to it evidently frustrates Pierre, bringing to the surface tensions that date back to their teenage years. Ultimately, The Kids In The Crowd, a well-meaning but rather vanilla document, is about the relationship between Chuck and Pierre – the kids on the stage.

Verdict: 3/5

Simple Plan: The Kids In The Crowd is released on July 8 via Amazon Prime