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"24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE"
(2002) (Steve Coogan, Danny Cunningham) (R)

Alcohol/
Drugs
Blood/Gore Disrespectful/
Bad Attitude
Frightening/
Tense Scenes
Guns/
Weapons
Extreme Mild Heavy Minor Heavy
Imitative
Behavior
Jump
Scenes
Music
(Scary/Tense)
Music
(Inappropriate)
Profanity
Moderate None None *None Extreme
Sex/
Nudity
Smoking Tense Family
Scenes
Topics To
Talk About
Violence
Extreme Extreme Mild Moderate Moderate


QUICK TAKE:
Comedy/Drama: A TV reporter moonlights as a music mogul and helps usher in various musical styles over several decades in Manchester, England.
PLOT:
It's 1976 and Cambridge-educated TV reporter Tony Wilson (STEVE COOGAN) and his wife Lindsay (SHIRLEY HENDERSON) attend a small concert featuring an unknown band by the name of The Sex Pistols. Motivated by the raw energy of their music, Tony convinces their friend, Alan Erasmus (LENNIE JAMES), to start their own venue where such bands can perform.

Eventually meeting manager Rob Gretton (PADDY CONSIDINE), the three then form Factory Records, a label with no binding contracts with their bands that include Joy Division fronted by Ian Curtis (SEAN HARRIS).

Years pass and musical styles and tastes change. As a result, Tony signs on new bands such as Happy Mondays fronted by Shaun Ryder (DANNY CUNNINGHAM) and managed by Martin Hannett (ANDY SERKIS), while also opening their own club, The Hacienda.

Eventually divorced from Lindsay and now seeing Yvette Livesey (KATE MAGOWAN), a former Miss United Kingdom, Tony tries to keep the company afloat - despite his various bad business decisions - while still working as a human interest TV reporter. With the musical market changing over to Rave, and ecstasy and drug dealers ruling the scene, Tony tries to maintain his vision of artistic freedom for his clients.

WILL KIDS WANT TO SEE IT?
If they're into punk rock music or the Rave scene, they just might.
WHY THE MPAA RATED IT: R
For strong language, drug use and sexuality.
CAST AS ROLE MODELS:
  • STEVE COOGAN plays a human interest TV reporter who decides to get into the music business by forming a label with various punk bands and opening his own clubs. An unorthodox businessman, he doesn't have anyone sign binding contracts. He also smokes, drinks, uses drugs and accepts oral sex from a stranger who's not his wife.
  • LENNIE JAMES plays a friend of Tony's who helps form Factory Records. He uses drugs.
  • SHIRLEY HENDERSON plays one of Tony's wives who's around when he gets the idea to get into the music business. She smokes and has sex with a man in retaliation for Tony cheating on her.
  • PADDY CONSIDINE plays a producer and founding member of Factory records who smokes and has a short temper.
  • ANDY SERKIS plays a testy record producer who smokes and uses strong profanity.
  • SEAN HARRIS plays the lead singer of a band who hangs himself.
  • DANNY CUNNINGHAM plays a band member with a drug problem.
  • CAST, CREW, & TECHNICAL INFO

    HOW OTHERS RATED THIS MOVIE


    Curious if this title is entertaining, any good, and/or has any artistic merit?
    Then read OUR TAKE of this film.


    (Note: The "Our Take" review of this title examines the film's artistic merits and does not take into account any of the possibly objectionable material listed below).


    OUR WORD TO PARENTS:
    The following is a quick look at the content found in this R-rated film. Profanity consists of at least 116 uses of the "f" word, while other expletives, colorful phrases and sexually related dialogue are also present. Various instances of sexual activity are present, including a woman performing oral sex on a man, his wife having sex with someone in a bathroom stall, a porno tape showing two women fooling around and some implied sex. Male and female full frontal nudity is also present.

    All sorts of characters drink and/or smoke, and various ones use various sorts of drugs including pot, cocaine and ecstasy, while another is noted as being an addict of heroin and other substances. Various characters have varying degrees of bad attitudes, including some guys who feed rat poison to many pigeons and then watch in glee as they die.

    Violence consists of some drive-by shootings and other gun use, some fighting and struggling and a person commits suicide by hanging (we just see the swinging feet). Should you still be concerned about the film's appropriateness for yourself or anyone else in your home, you may want to look more closely at our detailed listings for more specific information regarding the film's content.

    For those concerned with bright flashes of light on the screen, a great deal of that occurs in various scenes, including full strobe effects.

    For those concerned with bouncy camera shots that could induce motion sickness in those prone to that from visuals, the film also contains many scenes that include that.


    ALCOHOL OR DRUG USE
  • Tony comments that hang gliding is a high and then adds that it's a physical, legal high.
  • Various people drink beer at a small concert.
  • Alan smokes pot with Tony and Lindsay and all seem lethargic from doing so (they also appear to have been drinking).
  • Various people drink beer.
  • Alan drinks where others also drink.
  • Alan smokes a joint and then passes it to Tony.
  • Some band members drink beer.
  • Alan appears to smoke a joint.
  • A producer drinks.
  • Various people drink beer at a concert.
  • Various band members drink beer.
  • Lindsay might be smoking a joint.
  • People drink at another concert.
  • Tony orders a gin and tonic in his club.
  • Tony states that a band member's (Bez) drug of choice was ecstasy.
  • Various people drink.
  • Tony might be smoking a joint.
  • Martin drinks from a bottle.
  • Band members do drugs, but we can't see exactly what they're using. We then see them doing more drugs, and then later see some snorting cocaine.
  • Various people drink.
  • Various people have beers with them on a bus.
  • Tony mentions the best drugs and other things being at his club.
  • We see some cocaine being cut and then see Tony doing some. We then see an imagined view of a very long line of cocaine on the road. Later, Tony appears somewhat high while preparing for an interview.
  • Tony mentions that his club was in financial straits because everyone was buying ecstasy from the drug dealers rather than alcohol at his bars.
  • There's some talk about trying to get Shaun off smack (heroin) via methadone, but it's stated that he got addicted to that as well. We then see the vials of methadone spilled on the floor of an airport (and the addict down there trying to ingest it). There's talk that he was then sent to Barbados where there wasn't any heroin, but there was plenty of crack.
  • Various people drink beer.
  • There's talk of Manchester being a place for cheap, abundant drugs.
  • Tony and others smoke some sort of drug brought back from Barbados.
  • BLOOD/GORE
  • Tony cuts his thumb so that he can sign his producer's contract in blood (we only see a tiny bit of blood).
  • A singer appears to be having a seizure on stage and is then taken off it where we see blood from his mouth.
  • We see a dead body in a casket at a funeral home (but beyond being dead, it's not bloody or gory).
  • DISRESPECTFUL/BAD ATTITUDE
  • A band is called Joy Division and comments are made about that and its connection to Nazi Germany.
  • Tony, who's married, allows a woman to perform oral sex on him.
  • We hear that two band guys put rat poison into food that they then fed to 3,000 pigeons before shooing them away to take flight. We then see many of them falling from the sky and the two guys hitting or kicking the dead birds as they fall to the rooftop (Tony, the narrator, then pops in to state that what we're seeing is just a recreation and that no pigeons were harmed in the making of the film).
  • Various band members take advantage of Tony's generosity and spend lots of his money.
  • FRIGHTENING SCENES
  • A singer appears to be having a seizure on stage and is then taken off it where we see blood from his mouth.
  • GUNS/WEAPONS
  • We see archival footage of something called a bouncing bomb that shows a large round object bouncing off the surface of the water (but no explosion occurs).
  • Handgun: Carried by Martin and fired at Tony (but with blanks) and another is fired by Shaun into a mirror.
  • Tony mentions that guns became prevalent at his club along with the drug dealers. We then see a succession of scenes of thugs shooting at others with their guns (including a drive-by shooting). We then hear more gunshots and a person falls, but we can't tell what's happened.
  • IMITATIVE BEHAVIOR
  • Due to accents and some poor audio recording/playback, some parts of the film are quite hard to understand, thus offering the possibility of some missed colorful phrases. That said, we did hear the following: "That's f*cking bullsh*t," "F*ck you," "You f*cking c*nt," "That's f*cking great," "F*ck off," "Stop that horrible f*cking racket," "F*cking retard," "You f*cking tw*t," "What the f*ck /is going on/are you doing?" "F*cking calm down," "For f*ck's sake," "F*cking wankers," "You're f*cked," "Bloody" (adjective), "Balls" (testicles), "Wankers," "Sucked," "Bloody hell," "Shut up" and "Bastard."
  • A guy spits.
  • Tony cuts his thumb so that he can sign his producer's contract in blood (we only see a tiny bit of blood).
  • We see that a person has hanged himself (all we see are his swinging feet).
  • We hear that two band guys put rat poison into food that they then fed to 3,000 pigeons before shooing them away to take flight. We then see many of them falling from the sky and the two guys hitting or kicking the dead birds as they fall to the rooftop (Tony, the narrator, then pops in to state that what we're seeing is just a recreation and that no pigeons were harmed in the making of the film).
  • Martin knocks on the door and fires a gun at Tony, but there are apparently blanks in it.
  • JUMP SCENES
  • None.
  • MUSIC (SCARY/TENSE)
  • None.
  • MUSIC (INAPPROPRIATE)
  • Various songs had lyrics that could not be understood, thus offering the possibility of potentially objectionable material being in them.
  • PROFANITY
  • Due to accents and some poor audio recording/playback, some parts of the film are quite hard to understand. That said, we did hear at least 116 "f" words, 7 "s" words, 5 slang terms using female genitals ("c*nt" and "tw*t"), 1 slang term using male genitals ("pr*ck"), 1 slang term for breasts ("t*t"), 4 hells, 4 wankers, 2 asses, 2 uses of "Jesus" and 1 use each of "For God's sakes" and "Oh God" as exclamations.
  • SEX/NUDITY
  • Due to accents and some poor audio recording/playback, some parts of the film are quite hard to understand, thus offering the possibility of some missed sexual dialogue.
  • Tony comments that hang gliding is the most amazing feeling and that it's better than sex.
  • Tony makes some comment about a man who later did or tried to sleep with his wife.
  • Tony and Lindsay passionately make out at a concert.
  • Alan makes some sort of comment about being a virgin.
  • A man invites Tony out to his van where we see two women waiting for them inside the shag-carpeted walls (one is bare-breasted, the other is in skimpy lingerie). The man tells one of the women what sounded like, "On your knees…and eat." We then see a shot of Tony's leg and the others encouraging him and telling him not to be shy (as he stands before them). The two women then feel his clothed crotch (one telling the other to "feel that") and soon one is performing oral sex on him (we see her head at his crotch, but don't see the actual act). He then asks if he can feel her "t*ts" while she does that and so he does. We then see Lindsay out looking for Tony and she then comes up to the van and opens the back hatch where we again see the woman's head at Tony's crotch. He tells Lindsay that it's not how it looks and then asks the woman if she can finish as Lindsay walks away (we later see him exit the van and finish buckling his belt). He later comments that Lindsay caught him getting a "blow job" from a hooker.
  • We then see Lindsay immediately making out with a man at the club. Moments later, Tony walks into the bathroom where he hears sexual sounds and then finds Lindsay fooling around with a man he knows. We see her in her bra and the two continue going at it against a bathroom stall wall (and it appears they're having sex, but we don't see below their waists). An older man (the real life man being played by a younger one in the stall) then says that he doesn't recall that ever happening (prompting Tony to say that when you must pick between the truth and the legend, pick the legend).
  • A band is called Joy Division and comments are made about that and its connection to Nazi Germany where Nazis picked out women to have sex with them to breed more Aryans (or something like that).
  • We briefly see a porno tape playing on TV that shows one woman licking another woman's bare breast. We also see a man's bare butt as he's being "whipped," as well as a woman in a thong bottom.
  • We see a woman removing another woman's panties and then see brief full frontal nudity.
  • We see some suggestive dancing in a club and then see Tony making out with Yvette. We later see the two of them in bed (but don't see anything beyond her bare back as her head is on his shoulder with the rest of them under the covers).
  • We see various men's bare butts from a distance as they enter a body of water. From a distance, we see brief male full frontal nudity as one of those men sits buck naked on a rock in that water.
  • SMOKING
  • Tony, Lindsay, Rob, Alan and Martin each smoke several times, while scores of other people smoke throughout the film. In addition, in some scenes it's difficult to tell whether characters are smoking cigarettes or pot.
  • TENSE FAMILY SCENES
  • We see a grieving mother standing over her son's body in a coffin. We later see another funeral.
  • Lindsay leaves Tony (in a very peaceful and non-confrontational way, although he asks her not to leave him).
  • We hear that Tony had another wife and child and that he considers himself a bad parent.
  • TOPICS TO TALK ABOUT
  • The historical accuracy of the film in portraying the events that occurred in it.
  • We see that a person has hanged himself (all we see are his swinging feet).
  • Punk rock music and the Rave scene.
  • The use of Ecstasy.
  • VIOLENCE
  • We see some footage of Tony crashing while hang gliding for a TV report, but he's unhurt.
  • In some footage where it's hard to tell what's occurring, some struggling is briefly seen as is a man throwing a punch. A person then has a microphone stand that they're using to ward off others.
  • We see that a person has hanged himself (all we see are his swinging feet).
  • We hear that two band guys put rat poison into food that they then fed to 3,000 pigeons before shooing them away to take flight. We then see many of them falling from the sky and the two guys hitting or kicking the dead birds as they fall to the rooftop (Tony, the narrator, then pops in to state that what we're seeing is just a recreation and that no pigeons were harmed in the making of the film).
  • Rob grabs Tony (for spending a lot of money on an artsy table) and they both end up on the floor.
  • Tony mentions that guns became prevalent at his club along with the drug dealers. We then see a succession of scenes of thugs shooting at others with their guns (including a drive-by shooting). We then hear more gunshots and a person falls, but we can't tell what's happened.
  • A person pushes another person.
  • Shaun ends up firing a gun into a mirror.



  • Reviewed August 12, 2002 / Posted August 16, 2002

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