If you are nostalgic for the British post-punk rock scene of the late 1970s and early 1980s and want to learn more about bands like Joy Division, Happy Mondays, and New Order, Michael Winterbottom's 24 Hour Party People is your ticket. Shot on digital video, Party People is a wild and often dizzying ride that has passion and energy, great music, and playful humor (along with the obligatory "f" words, drugs, and sex). The soundtrack features bands such as the Sex Pistols, Joy Division, the Clash, New Order, and A Certain Ration, music that keeps the energy popping from start to finish. Part documentary and part fiction, the film is narrated by impresario Tony Wilson (Steve Coogan) who was the driving force behind Factory Records, an indie label that played an important role in the spread of the new wave sound, overseeing early works of such bands as Big in Japan, Echo and the Bunnymen, and Cabaret Voltaire.
The film is not a comprehensive look at the total Manchester scene that included such great bands as The Charlatans, Stone Roses, Inspiral Carpets, and The Smiths but concentrates solely on the impact of Wilson and Factory Records. It follows Wilson as he goes from promoting Friday night sessions at the Factory Club to opening the birthplace of rave, the famous Hacienda Dance Club, while keeping his day job as a TV reporter and host for a local TV station in Manchester. After a hilarious opening sequence showing journalist Wilson hang gliding, the film turns to a Sex Pistols concert in 1976 where actual footage of the Pistols is interspersed with actors performing the songs. Although only 40 people attended, Wilson had a vision of what was possible and the small number in attendance didn't faze him, "How many people", he asks, "were at the Last Supper"?
Wilson persuades his station to televise a Sex Pistols performance, an event that led to Wilson being asked to manage several of Manchester's rock groups. We soon meet Ian Curtis (Sean Harris), lead singer for the band Joy Division, his producer Martin Hannett (Andy Serkis) and Happy Monday's singer Shaun Ryder (Danny Cunningham), bands that helped put Factory Records on the map. Harris conveys Curtis' electric energy and manic stage personality while performing great Joy Division songs such as "Love Will Tear us Apart" and "Atmosphere". Unable to come to terms with growing fame and faced with crippling epileptic seizures and an impending divorce, Curtis committed suicide on May 18, 1980 at age 23, a sad end for a consummate artist whose personal agony translated into music of sublime melancholy.
Wilson is often exasperating, throwing around words like semiotics and postmodernism, but his good-natured humor asserts itself as when he talks directly to the camera saying "you won't see this scene now but it might turn up on the DVD outtakes". In spite of all the absurdity, Wilson comes across as a man of integrity who was offered a large sum of money for his empire but refused, explaining to the audience that he "avoided selling out by never acquiring anything worth selling". Personally, I would have liked to have less laughs and a bit more information about these musicians, what kept them going or, as in the case of Curtis, what drove them to an early death. 24 Hour Party People, however, is not an in-depth character study but a fast-paced, offbeat paean to rock 'n' roll history, the people who made it, and the music we still remember.
The film is not a comprehensive look at the total Manchester scene that included such great bands as The Charlatans, Stone Roses, Inspiral Carpets, and The Smiths but concentrates solely on the impact of Wilson and Factory Records. It follows Wilson as he goes from promoting Friday night sessions at the Factory Club to opening the birthplace of rave, the famous Hacienda Dance Club, while keeping his day job as a TV reporter and host for a local TV station in Manchester. After a hilarious opening sequence showing journalist Wilson hang gliding, the film turns to a Sex Pistols concert in 1976 where actual footage of the Pistols is interspersed with actors performing the songs. Although only 40 people attended, Wilson had a vision of what was possible and the small number in attendance didn't faze him, "How many people", he asks, "were at the Last Supper"?
Wilson persuades his station to televise a Sex Pistols performance, an event that led to Wilson being asked to manage several of Manchester's rock groups. We soon meet Ian Curtis (Sean Harris), lead singer for the band Joy Division, his producer Martin Hannett (Andy Serkis) and Happy Monday's singer Shaun Ryder (Danny Cunningham), bands that helped put Factory Records on the map. Harris conveys Curtis' electric energy and manic stage personality while performing great Joy Division songs such as "Love Will Tear us Apart" and "Atmosphere". Unable to come to terms with growing fame and faced with crippling epileptic seizures and an impending divorce, Curtis committed suicide on May 18, 1980 at age 23, a sad end for a consummate artist whose personal agony translated into music of sublime melancholy.
Wilson is often exasperating, throwing around words like semiotics and postmodernism, but his good-natured humor asserts itself as when he talks directly to the camera saying "you won't see this scene now but it might turn up on the DVD outtakes". In spite of all the absurdity, Wilson comes across as a man of integrity who was offered a large sum of money for his empire but refused, explaining to the audience that he "avoided selling out by never acquiring anything worth selling". Personally, I would have liked to have less laughs and a bit more information about these musicians, what kept them going or, as in the case of Curtis, what drove them to an early death. 24 Hour Party People, however, is not an in-depth character study but a fast-paced, offbeat paean to rock 'n' roll history, the people who made it, and the music we still remember.