Sid & Nancy - Criterion Collection

Rating:
Summary: Effective and Disturbing
Review: "Kill me, Sid, just kill me!" Nancy Spungen (Webb) is shrieking, and at that point the entire viewing audience is ready to oblige. The shrewish, whiney, manipulative and very tragic Miss Spungen has found a soulmate in Sid Vicious (Oldman), the ultimate punk-rocker from the Sex Pistols. With his trademark disdain for all things conventional, including life itself, Vicious and Spungeon are a pathetic pair, and one very potent reminder of a turbulent era that neither of them survived. As Spungen, sporting the uniform of the period - motorcycle jacket, shredded fishnet hose and skyscraper shoes - Webb, a truly gifted and underrated actress, proves she's not just another pretty face. In fact she's pretty scary with her ratty bleached hair and apocalyptic makeup, but it's the depth of Spungen's debilitating misery that Webb captures in an ugliness that borders on bravery. It's a pathetic portrait, rather than a *sym*pathetic one, with Webb's portrayal offering zero opportunities for caring about this character - except that Nancy Spungen was more than just a character in a movie. Her tragedy of self-destruction is one that has been played many times both on- and offscreen, but seldom in such a harrowing and searing composition of addiction, despair and emptiness. Oldman (second choice was Daniel Day Lewis!), as Vicious, also gives a harrowing, repellant performance - underscoring that the same qualities of arrogance and apathy that made him a star were the same qualities that eventually did him in. Schofield, as Johnny Rotten, gains the only sympathy in the entire film, as he helplessly watches his friend and partner slide into the hellish grip of drugs and Spungen. David Hayman, as Malcolm McLaren, is passive wickedness itself as the instigator who then sits back and watches the drama unfold. Then there's Courtney Love's brief fling - begging the major question of why, if she was sporting the same frowsy harridan look in 1986, why is she still sporting it now? Director Cox (Repo Man) ably manages the story and cast, giving it all there is to give - but there's simply so little to care about and the afflictions that befall the main characters are completely of their own devising. With a fairly lengthy list of factual errors, the movie, described as "pure fantasy" by the real Johnny Rotten, is effective and disturbing, nonetheless, and distinctly gives you the feeling that it's not too far off the mark

Rating:
Summary: Sorry, Sex pistols, But I like this movie. Sue me.
Review: I was in seventh grade when I first saw this movie. I was just getting introduced to the whole punk rock scene, and I thought this movie was the best. I fell in love wtih Gary Oldman as Sid Vicious, and I really disliked Cloe Webb as Nancy. But as the years went on, and I knew more about the real Sex Pistols, the movie started to get more and more of a surreal depiction of what really went on during the short lived time of the Sex Pistols. And the band didn't really have anything to do with this movie and did not condone it. I mean sure, any movie biography is not going to be 100% accurate, but the reason I think the Sex Pistols didn't want to be a part of this movie was because it was much too hard to go back to such a turbulent time in their lives. The director Alex Cox, depicts the relationship of Sid And Nancy as a romantic tragedy, when in reality it was an obvious accident waiting to happen.
The movie begins with Sid being interrogated by the police, after they find Nancy dead in their Chelsea hotel room. And he begins the tale of when he first met Nancy. He was not impressed with her at first, but soon his curiosity for heroin, and her access of it , begins their volatile relationship. The band can't stand her, and want her away from them. She was the Yoko of punk rock. But something (and I do believe it was drugs) kept them together. Then the Sex Pistols break up, and Sid tries to go solo. It doesn't go too well, and the couple slip further and further into heroin, which then leads to the murder of Nancy.
Sid and Nancy is a really entertaining movie. Gary Oldman does an excellent portrayal of Sid Vicious, especially since he only had old footage to work with, and he wasn't too knowledgeable on the whole Sex Pistols story. Chloe Webb does a great job as Nancy by portraying how annoying she was and how controlling she was of Sid. I really didn't feel like this movie was a love story. Whenever they show their love scenes, I always felt sad. Maybe because I knew what was going to happen. Lookout for Courtney Love(another Yoko but for grunge rock!) 's big screen debut . She plays Nancy's friend Gretchen. The original music in this movie is awesome. The soundtrack is worth buying. The DVD is the best way to see this movie. It has a making of documentary, old footage of the Sex Pistols, and even an actual phone call of Sid Vicious a while before he died. A great movie to see this with is The Filth and the Fury, by Julien temple. It is a reaslistic story of what really happened, with the actual band members. it's a perfect way to compare and contrast. It makes you appreciate the movie Sid and Nancy more, and the vision Alex Cox was going for.



Rating:
Summary: LOVE ROCKS!!!!
Review: As rock movies and bio-pics go, Sid and Nancy is definitely one of the finest. I realize I'm only one of many who loved the performances and the production overall. I think it's best viewed on the Criterion Collection edition. Several attempts at purchasing the Criterion disk went awry for me, but I was lucky enough to rent one and be able to tape it. The video and audio transfer is pristine - leaps and bounds over the old Embassy videotape edition and the currently-available MGM transfer- and the extras are very entertaining. There's a very amusing 30-minute documentary about making the film - with cast members joking around and teasing each other. The commentary track with Gary Oldman, Chloe Webb, Alex Cox and Abbe Wool all contributing their memories and insight was very interesting. I even loved the menu screen with an outtake of Webb and Oldman hamming it up while in costume for the MY WAY scene. One of these days I'll be able to buy the disc proper, but for now the video copy will suffice.

I was advised Criterion had to take it out of print as the licensing agreement between Criterion and the production studio had expired with the production studio opting to not renew. I only wish there was a petition of sorts to re-activate that agreement. With films such as "Armageddon" and the "Beastie Boys Anthology" available on Criterion, it's quite a shame Sid and Nancy no longer is.

Rating:
Summary: Gary Oldman's performance can not redeem Sid Vicious' life
Review: The only problem with labeling Sid Vicious as the bass player for the seminal punk rock group the Sex Pistols is that the man could not really play the bass guitar. Paradoxically, this was part of what made him famous, along with his violent temper that resulted in random acts of violence onstage. When the punk movement emerged its significance was more political than musical, with the focus being on the anarchy and nihilism as a response to disenfranchisement. So when the Sex Pistols would play a gig the fact that Vicious was apparently play the bass line for a different song than the one the bad was playing was seen not for what it was, musical incompetence, but rather as an intentional anarchist act by a provocateur. Paul McCartney, Bill Wyman, and any other notable bass player who went off on his own would have been booted from their group, but Vicious became a legend and descended hand in hand into both hell and history with his girl friend and partner in personal destruction, Nancy Spurgen.

Director Alex Cox documents the destruction and in case anyone stumbles upon this 1986 film without even a tabloid knowledge of the fate of the title characters "Sid & Nancy" starts with Sid sitting in a hotel room while Nancy's corpse lies on the bathroom floor. The film agrees with Sid's confession that he stabbed Nancy, and when the cops investigating her death ask Sid how they missed we get to go back to the beginning. Several years earlier Sid (Gary Oldman) and Johnny Rotten (Drew Schofield), visit Linda (Ann Lambton) the dominatrix, where Nancy (Chloe Webb), an American groupie and junkie is staying. Sid does not need Nancy's encouragement to engage in self-destructive behavior, but she approves of everything he does and thinks he is talented. To be clear, this validation comes after they become lovers, so there are additional reasons to doubt her line of thought despite the visual and audio evidence. But it is not like she is the only one reading Sid's life wrong. Malcolm McLaren (David Hayman) declares at one point: "Sidney's more than a mere bass player. He's a fabulous disaster. He's a symbol, a metaphor, he embodies the dementia of a nihilistic generation. He's a f*****' star." I will buy the disaster part, but the rest is wishful thinking on the part of people who should realize at some point that a mixture of silence and obscenity can be better explained by stupidity rather than profound insight.

There is no reason to invest this doomed pair with any sort of romantic trappings. You can call them the Romeo & Juliet of the punk generation, but Romeo & Tybalt had a better relationship. This is a film that is filled with visual metaphors for the doomed pair, and the one that sticks out for me is the one where they are sitting stoned in their bed in a hotel room and accidentally start a fire. It takes them a while to notice, but until the firemen show up and drag them away they never get to the point of caring. That pretty much describes my reaction to the film, and I doubt that I am alone in that regard. I suppose you could try to determine the point at which in the narrative these two people are doomed to their horrible deaths, but I pretty much go with the prologue. The only reason this story is being told is because these two end up dead.

The performances by Oldman and Webb are certainly more compelling than the characters that they play. I started out thinking that Sid & Nancy were simply a couple at the other end of the universe from Ron & Nancy in the White House. But then it struck me that "Sid & Nancy" is nothing more than "The Simple Life" for the punk generation, the story of a pair of worthless human beings who reinforce each other's worse traits, gloriously unaware that their lives are cosmic jokes. When Vicious sings "My Way," it does not become an anarchist anthem but just a song where the fact is being sung badly is suppose to impart an ironic frame of reference to the lyrics rather than simply indicating the lack of vocal talent by the singer. Unfortunately, at the end of "Sid & Nancy," Cox wants to suggest that their lives were an actual tragedy, when there is no evidence to support that conclusion in anything that we have seen.

Rating:
Summary: I really like this movie
Review: I know there are a few people out there who think this movie sucks,but I like it.It wasn't exactly true on some parts,but nevertheless intresting.A story that could only be made up in Hollywood,right?The tragic thing is,that this really happened,which gives the movie a unique powerful impact.It shows the bond between people in love,and all the struggles they go through together,until the very end.Bad dubbing at times,other then that,it's great.

Rating:
Summary: love and garbage
Review: This is a terrific movie that speaks compellingly to power of love: even when the lovers are two of the most repellent, disgusting parasites the world has ever known, we can't help but feel with them, grieve for them, wish them well. I've seen this movie many times, and it never fails to wrench me out of my complacency. The scene where Sid and Nancy kiss, oblivious to the garbage being dumped around them, says it all.