‘I was wrong about God. Turns out he likes that 70’s stuff after all…’
Fictional rock bands in movies are a mixed bag. For every Stillwater in Almost Famous or Spinal Tap from…well… This is Spinal Tap, you’ve got Brian Slade from Todd Haynes’ unbearable Bowie pastiche Velvet Goldmine. Still Crazy, Brian Gibson’s underrated take on the ageing rock band, presents us with Strange Fruit. They hate each other. They love each other. And the music is pretty good…
After mild success in the 1970s, Strange Fruit are persuaded to reform after a chance encounter between their keyboard player Tony Costello (Stephen Rea) and a concert promoter whose dad was a fan of the band (a recurring theme throughout). So, Costello recruits lead singer Ray Simms (Bill Nighy), bass player Les Wickes (Jimmy Nail) and drummer Beano (Timothy Spall) and the band hit the road.
While the trajectory of Still Crazy will be familiar to anyone who has seen any rock biopic (whether fictional or not), the performances and the emotional warmth of the screenplay (as well as the humour) make Still Crazy difficult to resist. Nighy, in particular, is fantastic in a rare leading role, indeed, he is so convincing that he definitely could have been a rock singer in another life (both Nighy and Nail used their own singing voices for the performance segments of the film).
Still Crazy has been all but forgotten about now but as rock biopics go it is one of the most purely enjoyable. Any film narrated by Billy Connolly is alright in my book.
