Kill Your Friends: A future cult classic or missed opportunity?

06 November 2015, 13:04 | Written by Alex Lee Thomson

(News)

This Tuesday 3rd November, invited members of the music and press community gathered for an advance screening of Kill Your Friends, a new British film directed by Owen Harris based on John Niven’s book of the same name. The film follows A&R man Steven Stelfox (Nicholas Hoult) as he highrolls the gak fuelled top end of the 1990’s music business; £100k contracts, bullshit, acid, keying a bag of showbiz on a flight to Austin, blackmail, and murder.

Its transition from music (semi) fiction to cinema isn’t as fluid as High Fidelity’s was, though the project in this case has at least stayed in British hands. Following Legend earlier this year it’s another homegrown film showing that England can just as easily romanticise hedonism and be as as fucked up and glamorous as our American counterparts.

The tone is comparable to US releases such as Wolf Of Wall Street or American Psycho, though while those films center their plot around a vague idea of “business” Kill Your Friends is unavoidably about the music industry. It’s very insular in that respect. Clocking in nearly two hours of in-jokes this film will without doubt fail to win critical or public acclaim. The majority of laughs from a room of insiders come from the throwaway comments and gags based on the day-to-day life of the industry - for instance, telling somebody your favourite song on the album is track 3. The rest of the humour is kind of flat, and there’s no huge one-liners or take away monologues. It’s not the ABCs of selling or Buddy Ackerman preaching “if you haven't turned establishment by 30, you've got no brains”. Cinematically, or stylistically, it’s unfortunately not that groundbreaking either. It’s fast and reckless, bright and loud for sure… though only in the same ways 24 Hour Party People was, or Trainspotting. It was all just a bit too thoughtless.

However it’s most of the above faults that will make this an absolute cult classic for decades to come. In thirty years time when a bright-eyed 19-year-old starts their internship at a record label (if labels are still kicking around then) this will be essential viewing. It’s a snapshot, keyhole view of the last hurrah of the old school business before the digital age. It’s Withnail And I for a very select circle. If you’re in that circle this is a damn right hilarious, dirty and at times little too close to the bone film. Outside that circle and it’s all a bit average.

Kill Your Friends is out now on general release across cinemas nationwide.