FOKER'S MOVIE REVIEW - THE BOAT THAT ROCKED (From Surrey Comet)

FOKER'S MOVIE REVIEW - THE BOAT THAT ROCKED

11:06am Tuesday 31st March 2009

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For those of you who have managed to miss all the recent hype surrounding this new Richard Curtis movie, I’ll fill you in.

The film is set on a floating pirate radio station in the North Sea during pop music’s finest era 1966. Substitute the famous illegal station name ‘Radio Caroline’ for ‘Radio Rock’ throw in a band of whacked out characters played by some of today’s most popular and likeable actors plus an award winning writer / director and you have your movie…you can’t loose!

I was lucky enough to be invited to a preview screening in London and to my surprise the film was actually introduced by the man himself, Richard Curtis. A good move this as it made the whole audience appreciate the film far more once you got some idea of the passion that Richard Curtis has for his music. The timing is also right as more and more people want to get away from the realities of the current financial downturn and nostalgia is the name of the game.

What’s that saying? ‘If you can remember the 60’s then you probably weren’t there’ well fortunately I do remember the 60’s and no I wasn’t on drugs it’s because I was only seven years old. It was an innocent time of the Beatles and the Stones, James Bond, the Moon landing and England winning the World Cup (which I don’t think is mentioned in the film?)

Schoolboy Carl (Tom Sturridge) has been sent by his Mum (nice cameo from Emma Thomson) to work for his Godfather Quentin (Bill Nighy) who runs the hugely popular pirate radio boat ‘Radio Rock’. This is either for Carl’s character building or another more personal reason like, which one of these misfits is your Dad? The crew are made up of a collection of every clichéd deejay you could imagine and are they the sort of company you would want to mentor your son or daughter? Well…yes they probably are. These men are thought of as Gods by the 25 million youngsters who tune in every night. We are told that in 1966 the BBC radio stations only dedicated 45 minutes to Rock n Roll, so there was a real need for he 24 hour pirates.

The leading deejay is The Count (Philip Seymour Hoffman) a cool, no nonsense American who plans to be the first person on radio to use the ‘F’ word and he, like all the crew have an absolute love for the music. His sidekick Big Dave (Nick Frost) an over sized love machine that doesn’t seem to have any problem with the women. Simple Simon (Chris O’Dowd) a quiet Irish ‘see you thorough the night’ type of deejay, Midnight Mark (Tom Wisdom) a broody James Dean type that wins over the girls by being silent and mysterious, Angus ‘The Nut’ an annoying Kiwi (Rhys Darby) and Wee Small Hours Bob (Ralph Brown) an old fashioned long haired bearded hippy, a cross between The Old Grey Whistle Test’s whispering Bob Harris and John Peel,. There is a great scene when Bob turns up for breakfast one morning only to be stared at by all the crew until asked by the Count ‘Who the ‘F’ are you?’ as this is the first time he had actually been seen outside of his late night slot.

The guys are supported by Thick Kevin (Tom Brooke) and ‘On the Hour’ John a timid man who lives to read the news.

Initially the crew see Carl as a posh pratt but gradually becomes accepted as one of them even to the extent of Big Dave introducing him to the delights of the opposite sex. Talking of which the only permanent female member of the crew is the lesbian Felicty (Katherine Parkinson). Everything is going on swimmingly until we have the return of the prodigal son, deejay Gavin (Rhys Ifans) ‘Radio Rock’s’ old King of the airwaves back from America to claim his crown.

This puts the Count’s nose out of joint and we get the clash of the titans as Gavin and the Count battle to be the stations top dog.

There is also an underlying story here with government minister Sir Alistair Dormandy (almost unrecognisable Kenneth Branagh) whose mission in life is to close the pirate stations and stop them from polluting the atmosphere with their pornography.

The gel that holds all this mayhem together is the ‘Fab’ music from the likes of The Kinks, The Who, The Rolling Stones, The Small Faces, The Hollies, The Supremes, Sandie Shaw, Smokey Robinson, Otis Redding, Jeff Beck, The Tremeloes, Lulu, Cream, The Beach Boys, I could go on and on. The soundtrack boasts 54 songs, each one a classic. A great CD or download for the car? A few critics have already slated the film for being too lightweight but you got to take it for what it is, a lot of fun…and did the Boat rock? Hell yes!