It’s a heck of a human interest story: Impoverished singer in a Journey cover band in Manila gets a “this is not a joke” e-mail from the actual group, saying they saw him on YouTube and want to try him out as their lead singer for an upcoming tour.
For the unassuming Arnel Pineda, who does a stunning Steve Perry, that missive was the start of a mind-blowing launch into a career as the classic-rock group’s new frontman.
Unfortunately, “Don’t Stop Believin’: Everyman’s Journey” squanders the inherent excitement in this Cinderella story, plodding from one performance to the next with unnecessary asides for veteran Journey members to talk about their own lives (trivia of interest to megafans and no one else).
The one piece of band history you really care about — why did the oft-referenced Perry drop out, anyway? — is totally blown off. A bandmate reduces his departure to a sentence: “It was this big, heavy thing.” What? Pineda is lovely, but I stopped believin’ in this documentary long before it was over.