If the Sony product placement at the very beginning of Avril Lavigne”s video for her new song, “Rock N Roll,” doesn”t stop you in your tracks, her stilted acting will.
Lavigne plays a comic book bad-ass come to life in a post-apocalyptic world. Call her “Mad Avril,” if you will. Lavigne may be a lot of things-including a spunky, strong singer- but an actress is not one of them. It”s almost painful to watch her try to emote her way through her tough-girl antics.
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Here she”s aided by Titanic’s”Billy Zane and “The Wonder Years”” Danica McKellar as they track down the Bearshark, which is, as you might guess, a bear with the head of a shark. We”d watch the Bearshark in anything, including, oh please God, a Sharknado sequel starring the Bearshark. (Yes, we know the Bearshark gets beheaded, but he couldn”t have been the only one).
The high production video moves at a fast clip, but feels compelled to put in “shocking” moments, like a really bad joke about a dog licking its balls, and a stunningly unsexy girl-on-girl kiss between Lavigne and McKellar. It”s only when Lavigne is leaning up against her souped-up getaway vehicle singing or when she grabs a very cool guitar that she seems remotely in her element.
She”s not helped by the paint-by-numbers rote rock song that took six writers to pen, including her, hubby Chad Kroeger, and super songwriter Dave Hodges.
“Rock N Roll” is the second single from Lavigne”s forthcoming fifth studio album out this fall, following “Here”s To Never Growing Up,” which peaked at No. 20 on the Billboard Hot 100.