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24 Hour Party PeopleThe muso shenanigans, arty posturing, suicide, dancefloor frenzy and gunplay that culminated in the excess all areas of 'Madchester' might have been captured on film way before 2002's 24 Hour Party People. As early as 1990 Tony Wilson (before he became 'Anthony') touted a Manchester music, guns and gangsters movie script (working title: 'The Mad Fuckers') here and in Hollywood.
However not even Wilson, for whom E meant egotism above ecstacy, dared include himself in the story. This ponderous, self-important "motor-mouth" ran arty Factory Records, but he also covered stories about sheep-herding ducks on the local TV news and was well aware that most Manchester hipsters considered him a "twat". Strange then, 10 years on, to see Wilson (Coogan) at the centre of this story, when it could have been Ian Curtis, Shaun Ryder - even Bez...
24 Hour Party People is as messy, contradictory and chaotic as Madchester itself, with Wilson at its centre as much a court jester as crown prince. Director Michael Winterbottom includes every detail of the Manchester post-punk scene, from headlines (Ian Curtis' suicide) to footnotes (A Certain Ratio's predilection for fake tan cream) and the film is nothing if not a not a comprehensive, even obsessive, account.
The film begins with the legendary Sex Pistols gig at the Free Trade Hall in 1977, which was attended by Wilson, Morrissey, Mick Hucknell, the Buzzcocks, the musicians who would go on to form Joy Division and producer genius Martin Hannett. It charts the rise and fall of the club, The Hacienda, and tracks the rise of Factory Records, before its DIY punk ethic finally capitalised on the million-selling success of New Order and the Happy Mondays... by going bankrupt with debts of ?500,000.
It's all great fun, part drama-doc, part sitcom, part post-modern exercise in film fragmentation and it never misses an opportunity to distract the audience, with a digression from Wilson himself or with myriad cameos: from Vini Reilly, Mark E Smith, Howard Devoto etc. This means it is rarely a moving film, except with the harrowing scenes of Ian Curtis' suicide and funeral. Generally it's a comedy of errors, especially in the casting. While Sean Harris is excellent as Curtis, and Andy Serkis is convincing as Joy Divsion's lunatic producer Hannett, in other areas the casting sucks: Ralf Little is no more Peter Hook than he is Mrs Merton, and Danny Cunningham does little more than impersonate Shaun Ryder.
But it's Coogan who carries the film: his Tony Wilson has more than a dash of Alan Partridge about him and it's the lunatic grafting of one daytime telly egotist onto another that is the key to the film's humour and provides its best moments.
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