With a bit more planning, could have been amazing...

Rating: 4/10 (9 November 1998)

Hmm. Admittedly, I'm a hard sell on this. As a long time Eno/Roxy Music/T Rex/Bowie/Iggy geek, this is my turf: better watch yourself, guys.
My problem with this isn't so much that they took liberties with the people the characters are so blatantly based on: it's that there was no reason to. Artistic license might dictate some liberties, but when the liberties taken go ABSOLUTELY NOWHERE WHATSOEVER, it's highly frustrating.
It doesn't help that the film begins with an orgy of in jokes: the "Play at maximum volume" Ziggy reference, the young kid finding the greenish eye during a schoolyard fight (Bowie's pupil was paralyzed during just such a scene,) etc. Great fun, but sets you up for a ride that just doesn't happen. Cliches galore follow (the disgusted parents, drugs, sex, etc.) I know the period, artists, and music this is based on like the back of my hand: therefore, I should not be saying "I have no idea what's going on" about halfway through the film.
No focus, no point, no follow-through. What's up with Jack Fairy? Why not just make him Brian Eno, like they did with the rest of the characters? Why invent this convoluted Jarvis Cocker lookalike? And why does Kurt Wild start out as Iggy Pop and end up as Kurt Cobain? To show that it will happen again? I'm not buying it.
This film is the one thing it should absolutely not have been: tedious.