Sid And Nancy
While the punk rock movement was actually started in Detroit (of all places) in 1969 by Iggy Pop and his band, The Stooges, the cornerstone, benchmark and brand name in the genre will always be The Sex Pistols, a group of crazed anarchists from Merry Olde England who despite having had a more limited run than The Ramones, The Misfits, and all of the other greats still managed to leave such an indelible mark that they came to epitomize the idea of what punk rock was forever. And no member was more idolized in many ways than their bassist Sid Vicious, not so much for his musical talent (he had next to none) but rather for his look, his couldnāt give a shit attitude, and his reportedly self destructive lifestyle after he took up with Nancy Spungen, an American groupie living in London after becoming estranged from her own family who hooked up with Sid and together they became forever known as punk rockās Romeo And Juliet, a label that was no doubt earned after Spungenās accidental death in a New York City hotel room at Sidās hands when he stabbed at her during an argument and only gave her a tiny, superficial wound, but with Spungen being a hemophiliac and both of them being too far gone on drugs at the time to know that anything was wrong (Sid supposedly passed out right after), she wound up unknowingly bleeding out and died hours later. Sid was charged with her death and facing possible prison time, so either out of fear of incarceration or utter depression over her death he went off on a mad heroin binge that ultimately resulted in his own death from an OD. As the legend grew, in 1986 writer / director Alex Cox made this film biography of the duo, which remains one of the most touching and saddest cautionary tales of all time, but it was not without controversy: Sex Pistols lead singer Johnny Rotten completely blasted the film, claiming that he was never formally contacted and asked to play any kind of a consulting role on the film while blasting the final product as being āmere fantasyā¦the Peter Pan versionā and even implying that Cox in his presenting of the story had somehow glamorized the use of heroin! Likewise, the other members of The Pistols have been known to comment on just what a toxic, nasty, annoying person the real Nancy Spungen was, even intimating that they felt that she had broken up the band and had mentally destroyed Sid so severely that she was indirectly responsible for his actual death. In the film, we have Gary Oldman (a complete unknown at that time) as Sid in what was certainly a relevatory performance for its time as Oldman so accurately captured Sidās look, mannerisms and attitude that reportedly during filming longtime Pistols fans were swarming the set and treating Oldman as if he were really Sid returned from the grave. In the role of Nancy, we get Chloe Webb, not quite as relevatory (or as attractive as the real Nancy) but who nonetheless deserves credit for throwing herself into the role and not being afraid to play Nancy as truly being distinctly unlikable so much so that we can see why others disliked her but can still understand how Sid had found himself a fellow self destructive soulmate. The first half of the film is notably better (or at least more fun) showing us just how the two main characters first met before documenting the rise of The Sex Pistols themselves with Andrew Schofieldās Rotten shown as being the true devil may care rebel who ironically was smart enough to know exactly what he was doing all along (even as the real Rotten famously pointed out that the actor who was playing him actually got his accent wrong) while Sid in many ways can best be described as someone who was just too stupid to properly handle the burden of fame but nonetheless became iconic thanks to his zombie like stage charisma (even as Rotten and the others wrote the lyrics while Sid contributed next to nothing). Then itās off to America for their big tour (with Nancy being told that thereās no room for an entourage so sheāll have to stay behind) as The Pistols play their tour dates and make history even as the band breaks up and Sid stays behind in New York, where Nancy finally joins him and they move into a famously scummy hotel for āartistsā called The Chelsea. This sets up the notoriously depressing yet compelling second half of the film, where Sid records his legendarily bonkers version of Frank Sinatraās My Way and forms his own band with himself as the lead singer only to see mixed results. Meanwhile, their drug use worsens within their own private little world of the The Chelsea hotel room, supplied by a ratty looking, scummy dealer (Xander Berkeley) and hanging around with a young Courtney Love (who had auditioned for the role of Nancy and probably would have been fine in the part) as a street girlfriend of Spungenās. We do get some sad laughs when the pair go to visit Nancyās family (including her grandparents) who all sit there horrified while she talks of methodone clinic visits and blathers on in an obvious drug haze about getting gigs for Sid and how heās gonna make all this money, which leads to the family deciding not to let them stay at the house, kicking them out to stay at a hotel instead, not welcome to return (when Sid asks her why, she sadly says itās because āthey know herā). There is also the excellent (and underrated) scene at the methodone clinc where the counselor (Sy Richardson) bluntly tells Sid that heroin is purposely sold and distributed to be the āgreat controllerā in order to keep people stupid and that while The Pistolsā notion of promoting anarchy can be a great one, as long as he stays on the junk, it doesnāt mean shit. And as depressing as the second half is, the last 20 to 30 minutes are truly gut wrenching as we watch Sid and Nancy completely crumble physically and mentally, clinging to each other for dear life until even that doesnāt mean anything anymore (and in this viewerās opinion, dispelling Rottenās belief that the film glorifies heroin for if anything, it accurately portrays it as being a rancid way of life). So harrowing is this part of the movie that it may be too much for some people to handle, too traumatic to watch two people who seem to love each other practically begging for their own deaths probably more due to inherent mental illness (which in Nancyās case, her own family claimed that to be her main issues) than any garden variety form of addiction, and the final scenes are even harder to watch, with Nancyās final, frightened moments and the cold, stark reality of Sid in the custody of the cops, callously being asked who the girl was as if she was just a random groupie (or victim). And yet at the very end Cox as writer and director manages to achieve a moment of touching, transcendent beauty (and something else that Rotten would sneer at) that was really the only reasonable way to end the film since most of us were well aware of Sidās actual fate, but the movie as a whole not only succeeds in recounting what this famously doomed couple were about, but also does so in terms of being a cautionary tale on the perils of heroin use and NOT as a biographical movie about the actual Sex Pistols band itself (thereās actually a couple of quality documentaries covering that subject). It is also the first of the many Gary Oldman roles where all that one can think is how he should have been nominated for / won an Oscar and is also a tragic love story that gives tragic a whole new definition (and even more sadly has gained a large following among mostly female viewers with their own personal demons who look at this story as being a reflection of the sadness in their own lives) that today remains a classic which not only successfully captures a certain time and place, but also an attitude like no other that only in being clean and free from drug addiction can one put it forth ever so clearly to the massesā¦
9/10