By Faris Tanyos for KDRV
 
December 15, 2009
 
Grade: B
 
"To all our listeners, this is what I have to say, God bless you all. And as for you b------ in charge, don't dream it's over. Years will come, years will go, and politicians will do f--- all to make the world a better place. But all over the world, young men and young women will always dream dreams and put those dreams into song. Nothing important dies tonight, just a few ugly guys on a crappy ship. The only sadness is that, in future years, there'll be so many fantastic songs that it will not be our privilege to play. But, believe you me, they will still be written, they will still be sung, and they will be the wonder of the world."
 
- The Count
 
I don't know how many nights I fell asleep to the radio when I was 14, with my $2 headphones blaring the "Peaches" song for the 300th time that week.
 
I had, like millions of kids, stumbled upon a sanctuary; that feeling of being privy to something forbidden... I wasn't a musically conceited, pretentious, egotistical punk then. I didn't know any better; that I wasn't supposed to admit to enjoying Boys to Men and Matchbox 20 and TLC and Mariah Carey and Everclear as much as Nirvana and Blur and Sound Garden. I listened to everything: Pop, rock, rap, Christian, country. My favorite tune was OMC's "How Bizarre"...
 
Rock 'n' Roll ain't fringe anymore, grunge isn't counterculture, it's used in every commercial jingle on TV... and radio is slowly being killed off, not by the video star, but by Mr. i-Pod and Mrs. i-Tune... Good or bad, it's reality, and the excitement of hiding my devil music from the folks is quickly becoming a non-issue... Because the folks are listening to the very same devil music... just wait until Eminem makes it onto the oldies station (if there still is an oldies station), you'll get it then...
 
When there's nothing to rebel against, the natives get restless.
 
Richard Curtis' "Pirate Radio" opens with that same 14-year-old kid... saying goodnight to his parents, going to his room, getting under the covers, and tuning in to Radio Rock. It's loosely inspired by Radio 270, one of a slew of pirate radio stations in the UK in the 1960s that broadcast from ships outside Britain's territorial waters. It was in response to the BBC, who played little popular music then, supposedly due in part to high royalties charged by the record industry. (How the tables have turned.) But the pirate stations weren't subject to those regulations. They could play whatever the hell they wanted, so long as they could sustain themselves on advertising revenue.
 
We are introduced to Radio Rock's world through the eyes of 18-year-old Carl (Tom Sturridge), sent to the ship by his mother Charlotte (Emma Thompson) after being expelled from school for youthful indiscretions. His Godfather Quentin (Bill Nighy) manages the station. Carl meets a predictably zany and colorful lot of DJs: The Count (Philip Seymour Hoffman), Gavin (Rhys Ifans, "Notting Hill"), Dr. Dave (Nick Frost, "Shaun of the Dead"), Breakfast DJ Simon Swafford (Chris O'Dowd), Angus (Rhys Darby, "Flight of the Conchords")... they're stuck in a Neverlandish Paradise, cut off from the outside world.
 
On land, meanwhile, the exacting and ruthless British Government Minister Sir Alistair Dormandy (Kenneth Branagh) is working tirelessly, with the assistance of his sidekick Twatt (Jack Davenport), to find the perfect legal loophole that will spell the end of these mutinous pirates.
 
Carl cycles through the usual plethora of coming-of-age moments; losing his virginity, coming to grips with family secrets, searching for life meaning...
 
Curtis employs a little too much Kumbaya; taking strenuous, tiresome lengths to show us how FUN and RAMBUNCOUS and CARING and CAREFREE and WONDERFULLY OFF-KILTER the ship's crew is. The plot meanders aimlessly through a series of scenes strung together without any cohesion: A ship wedding that ends in divorce after 17 hours, a game of chicken, visits from impressionable girls who idolize their favorite DJs...
 
The movie was summed up perfectly by Sir Matthew Valladao: "I liked it, but I really wanted to like it more."
 
"Pirate Radio" lacks purpose, usually a forgivable offense for Writer/Director Curtis, a romantic in the best way; he shamelessly and unapologetically throws everything at the screen, be it sappy and syrupy, and hopes it sticks. It worked with "Four Wedding and a Funeral", "Love Actually" and "Notting Hill"...
 
The dialogue is brilliant, Curtis' writing is fantastic. The cast, especially Nighy, Branagh, Ifans and Darby, are terrific. Unfortunately, the whole, puzzlingly doesn't add up to the sum of its parts. The film lacks narrative, and the humor and soundtrack aren't good enough to carry it without one. The characters are too shallow and emotionally detached to illicit our empathy. Sir Valladao hit the nail on the head when he said it felt like he was watching a series of skits. It's too bad, because the movie's basic idea could have amounted to something riveting, and Curtis has a built-in audience with music lovers. He doesn't bother getting into the logistics of the history of pirate radio. Dormandy and the glorious Twatt are comedic concoctions, brilliantly funny, but nothing more. Their characters had so much potential, but the film fails to provide them with enough screen time to make a dent.
 
"Pirate Radio" is a poor man's "Almost Famous" (a great movie), and a very poor man's "High Fidelity" (a masterpiece), which explored what it means to be a rock ‘n roll obsessive; with characters that were real and relatable. Curtis' DJs never feel believable, like people who really love music... just actors pretending to love music. Ironically, Hoffman played a music aficionado in "Almost Famous", Lester Bangs, one of the top 10 characters of the decade. Here he reprises his role, but it doesn't work in the scheme of the movie.
 
All said, a bad Curtis film is better than a hundred regurgitated Hollywood romcoms, and be it disappointing by his standards, it's still worth watching once... that it reminded me of what it felt like to hear music for the first time, and to love it, innocently and without judgment, wasn't a bad thing.
 
ftanyos@kdrv.com