Herald Rating: * * *
Cast: John Simm, Nicola Reynolds, Lorraine Pilkington, Danny Dyer, Shaun Parkes
Director: Justin Kerrigan
Rating: R18 (contains drug use, sex scenes and offensive language)
Running time: 1 hour, 34 minutes
Opens: Now showing at Rialto theatres
Review: Greg Dixon
An apolitical party statement on behalf of Young People Today: "The weekend has
landed. All that exists now is clubs, drugs, pubs and parties. I've got 48 hours off from the world, man. I gonna blow steam out of my head like a screaming kettle ..."
Catch the drift? Director Justin Kerrigan would like to think he has with his Trainspotting-goes-to-Cardiff-and-take-loads-of-Ecstasy tribute to rave culture.
Played out on the not very broad canvas of 48 hours in the Welsh capital, his first film is a short, sharp report on modern life seen through the bug eyes of a bunch of 20-somethings, Jip (Simm, seen in last year's television drama The Lakes), Lulu (Pilkington), Koop (Parkes), Moff (Dyer) and Nina (Reynolds).
The substance of the film is about taking substances to escape the drear of McJobs, dysfunctional families and something called reality.
Plotting is replaced - as befitting the subject matter - with stream of consciousness diatribes from Jip (as above)and the others on why straight culture (mums, dads and dead-end jobs) is naff while drugs, music and your mates are pukka.
It is more rant than rave (though the soundtrack will rattle your fillings and there's plenty of club and party life on show) with filming that's post-modern ad nauseam:
Characters talk to camera, subtitles cue you into the hidden meanings of conversations, there are slow-mo bits and sped-up bits, shouted monologues, imaged dialogues ... it becomes a bit tiring after a while.
But the sheer bravura and energy of the E-type performances (particularly Dyer's comic turn) make it more than the sum of its borrowed parts.
The result is one part Bluffers'Guide to Young People Today, with the rest a homage to being callow, taking large amounts of chemicals, talking bollocks and having a damned fine time.
You can take it or leave it, man, the kids really don't care. But then they never have.
