What to know
- Nimrods, formerly titled New Years Rev, is now playing in theatres after premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival last year.
- The comedy follows three teenage bandmates who embark on a road trip believing they’ve landed an opening slot for Green Day at the Hollywood Palladium.
- Green Day members Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt and Tré Cool make cameo appearances, while the soundtrack features several of the band’s biggest songs.
- The film draws inspiration from real moments in Green Day’s history but is a fictional coming-of-age road trip story—not a biopic.
Nimrods is a much better title for the Green Day-inspired road trip comedy, which premiered last year at the Toronto International Film Festival under the name New Years Rev.
Just released in theatres, the title of the rock band’s 1997 album is the perfect description for the plot of these young foolish guys who pile into a van convinced they’ve landed a dream gig opening for Green Day at the Hollywood Palladium.
Written and directed by Lee Kirk who cast Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong in his 2016 film Ordinary World and stayed pals, to be clear Nimrods is not a biopic. The band — Armstrong, Mike Dirnt, Tré Cool — which has sold more than 75 million records worldwide and been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is the dangling carrot for this fictional rock ‘n’ roll road trip tale.
Produced by Live Nation Studios, the film was announced by Green Day a year ago on their socials, posting: “So big news, we made a movie! We teamed up with our good friend Lee Kirk on a wild road trip coming of age comedy titled New Years Rev, about a garage band…who think they’ve scored the gig of their lives… opening for us. Except plot twist, it’s actually a prank.”
That is the premise of the movie, but it isn’t a spoiler.
The band, The Analog Dogs — played by Mason Thames (Tommy), Kylr Coffman (Fred) and Ryan Foust (Chad) — are three high school musicians who set out from Kansas City to Los Angeles after Tommy receives a phone call inviting them to open for Green Day on New Year’s Eve, not realizing it’s a prank by his older brother, Wayne (played by Keen Ruffalo). What follows is all the stupidity and misadventure of getting there.
Of course, Green Day has a couple of important cameos and Nimrods is packed with the band’s songs, sometimes used because they advance a scene, sometimes because the lyrics fit. “Brain Stew” accompanies one bizarre encounter involving a head in a jar, while “Bobby Sox” is synced perfectly after Mason meets Olivia, played by Mckenna Grace, with opening line, “Do you wanna be my girlfriend?” (Diehards will get a kick out of her name because Green Day has an unreleased song that fans called Olivia).
The cast also includes Kirk’s wife Jenna Fischer (Jody), Bobby Lee (Otis), Fred Armisen (Jim), Angela Kinsey (Wilma), Jolene Blalock (Deborah) and Ignacio Diaz-Silverio (Keith).
There are also two Analog Dogs songs written by Armstrong’s son, Jakob, plus a cameo from rising rock band The Paradox. Thousands of Green Day fans were extras for the concert scenes at the Palladium.
Fans will also note bits and pieces of Green Day’s history and lore in Nimrods. The ice cream truck is inspired by the 1993 bookmobile the band toured in when they were young. The bizarre “Sleepy” head-in-a-jar story came from a real incident in Germany.
Nimrods is a fun flick for anyone who started a band in high school, road-tripped to a concert, tried to sneak into a show or had a shithead older sibling. Green Day fans will get the biggest kick out of it, but you don’t have to be a diehard to appreciate Kirk’s message behind the madness: friendship, music, youthful stupidity and chasing your dreams.
