Question: Why is he Frank Sidebottom?

My interpretation is that in the film the mask is meant to be an original, not a copy of Frank Sidebottom' s. Frank Sidebottom in the film does not exist.

That' s the problem I have with this film... It's supposed to be a truly original film and they just go and copy a very important attribute from another musician/artist... Dunno, feels kind of fake. I have read about the connection between the screeenwriter and the real Frank, but still... I would have at least created an original mask, as the character is different, and comes from a different time and background.

I had the same problem watching Velvet Goldmine. Seeing Ewan Macgregor and the other guy singing The Stooges, and Brian Eno' s songs, pretending they were their own... Feels fake. Taking an original attribute from an artist and placing it on a trendier, cuter fictional character. The music was ok, but felt like a less inspired version of bands like White Hills.

Overall I give a 6 to Frank. Not that bad but not that great either. An extremely hipster affair.

"It's a reference no American kid would get."

This is a British film.

The film was partially based on the memoirs of Jon Ronson who Was the replacement keyboard player for the real Frank Sidebottom in the late eighties. The film makers introduced aspects of Daniel Johnson and Captain Beefheatt to arrive at the sort of composite character of Frank depicted in the film.

In a sense I think the film could be seen (intentionally or otherwise) as an exagurrated, fictionalised and grandiose epitaph kind of like Royal Tenembaums.

The irony of this film is that is preaches the message that being an outsider is fine and that you don't need to be accessible to be successful, just be who you are and you'll find creative contentment and, perhaps, your audience and yet it needed to hijack the image and forename of someone famous to even get noticed.

Put simply there's no way this film would be half as successful as it is if the director had disguised the main character in some random mask and called it "Bob" or whatever. Pretty much undermines the whole message of the film.