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October 19, 2004
Mad, mad Manchester and the strange story of ‘24 Hour Party People’
There comes a time in every young man’s or woman’s life where there exists a vast empty void, a veritable plethora of emptiness that glares back across the abyss. Unfeeling. Soulless.
And that space for me exists here, in the Entertainment section of the Oracle. I stand resolved to fill that space.
Writers in past issues have often taken advantage of these pages to bring to attention noteworthy films, music or art that deserves exposure to a wider audience. Now it’s my turn.
Relatively new to home video is Michael Winterbaum’s latest adventure in English cinema, 24 Hour Party People.
Party People is the true story of Tony Wilson, perhaps the cheesiest anchorman/TV personality of all time, and, more importantly, a key figure in Manchester’s vibrant music culture.
Wilson (portrayed hilariously by Steve Coogan) endures covering humiliating “human interest” stories about ducks trained as sheep herders by day and operating the landmark Factory Records label and Hacienda nightclub by night.
When Wilson wasn’t reminding people that he went to Cambridge University and describing for them the seriousness of his journalistic integrity, he was signing and promoting such luminaries like the Buzzcocks, Joy Division, New Order and the Happy Mondays.
The film’s broad scope encompasses the countless ups and downs of the “Madchester” scene: from the first Sex Pistols show in 1976 to the 1992 closing of the Hacienda; from the suicide of Joy Division frontman Ian Curtis (think Kurt Cobain of the UK) to the explosion of rave and ecstasy culture and the countless drug addictions of the Happy Mondays’ Shaun Ryder.
Winterbaum’s direction gives the film a unique style by incorporating a narrative structure based on
Wilson’s constant asides to the camera and the metaphorical nature of his recreated TV bits.
Although penetrating the thick Mancunian accents and slang of the film’s characters takes a good ear, the soundtrack and the absorbing story of the music and the people who made it more than compensate.
Posted by msveum at October 19, 2004 11:53 AM
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