24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE (2002)  ***

Reviewed 8/17/02

Each successive Michael Winterbottom film further proves his wide-ranging talent while defying auteur-minded fans because no film is quite like the other.  Opening with a credit sequence that verges on turning into a Stan Brakhage film, this apparent ode to the punk and rave music scene from the point of view of Tony Wilson (Steve Coogan), co-founder of Factory Records, is really about Manchester and its humanity (as the title indicates). The movie, which embraces the anarchic qualities of its music movements, lies straight to the viewer as to what it’s about. Wilson claims the story is not his but devoted to those "geniuses" who made the music; however, Ian Curtis (Sean Harris, who shines) and Shaun Ryder (Danny Cunningham) get scant screen time while Coogan as Wilson mugs it relentlessly. Coogan manages to be just charming enough to keep us from getting sick of him, but more music and less Wilson would have been nicer (even if it’s not ultimately about the music).  Winterbottom plays with his untrustworthy, self-reflexive narrator, and the movie practically deconstructs itself as it progresses (one funny bit notes a cut scene that will likely appear on the DVD). When Wilson quotes John Ford in printing the legend, the movie admits to its mythologizing even while slyly undercutting it. In the end, it’s probably a little too clever for its own good. Even as the film lies about the details, its setting has the feel of credibility, capturing a time and place, not just in how it looks, but the tone, the energy. That at least is an impressive feat.