Sid and Nancy

Plot synopsis:
The film opens on 12 October 1978, with several police officers dragging Sid Vicious (Gary Oldman) out of the Hotel Chelsea following the death of his girlfriend, Nancy Spungen (Chloe Webb). Sid is soon driven to a police station and upon arrival is asked to describe what happened. Police officers become frustrated when Sid is visibly troubled and unable to speak.
A little more than a year earlier, in 1977, close friends and band members Sid and Johnny Rotten (Andrew Schofield) meet Nancy, a heroin-addicted groupie who had come to London to bed the Sex Pistols. Sid dismisses her at first, as her sexual intentions are obvious, but begins dating her after feeling sympathy for the rejection she faces from fellow punk stars and after she sells him heroin; it is implied that she introduces him to the drug. The two fall deeply in love, but their self-destructive, drug-fueled relationship frays Sid's relationship with the rest of the band, which eventually breaks up on 17 January 1978, in the midst of a disastrous American tour which features Sid strung out of his mind, often drunk or on meth, and physically violent. Although several of his friends and acquaintances warn him of Nancy's devastating effect on his life, Sid stubbornly ignores these warnings.
Sid, now living in New York, attempts to start a solo career with Nancy as his manager, only to be dismissed as a has-been. By now, both he and Nancy are heavily addicted to heroin, and Nancy has spiraled into a deep depression. Sid loses interest in Nancy sexually and wants out of a suicide pact he made with her. Their love affair ends tragically one night when, during an argument in which Sid announces his plans to stop using heroin and return to England to re-start his life, a suicidal Nancy begs him to kill her. She attacks him and they fight in a drug-induced haze, leading to him stabbing her, although whether or not it was intentional is left to interpretation. They fall asleep and later Nancy awakes and stumbles into the bathroom, where she collapses and dies. Sid is bailed out temporarily by his mother who is also a heroin addict. After getting a pizza, some kids convince him to dance with them. Meanwhile, a taxi with Nancy riding in the back seat picks Sid up and drives away as the two embrace. The postscript then says that Vicious died of an intentional heroin overdose, and they were buried together. Their gravestone read: "R.I.P. Nancy and Sid."

Tags: cult, murder

Review:
Gary Oldman plays Sid Vicious, the bassist for British punk rock group the Sex Pistols.
Filled with all sorts of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, Sid and Nancy is a seriously wild ride.If there's anything that makes this film, it's Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb.
Instead, I only want to learn about it in vulgar detail from a great film like Sid and Nancy..
Finally upgraded from VHS to the special edition DVD of this Alex Cox film about the ill fated Sid Vicious & his honey Nancy Spungen.Watched it twice in fact , just had to hear the commentary from Cox because he is a director who I admire for trying to tap into the conscious of the subject he tackles.As an old punk myself it would be easy for me to be biased and lean with a nostalgic slant with the film, but truth is this film doesn't glamorise the duo because they are portrayed as the pathetic self destructive couple they were.
The film perfectly captures the time frame of what is indisputably the music and cultural phenomenon known as Punk Rock, the only blight on this great piece of work is the ending, which as Cox agrees is far too romanticised after the harshness the viewer has just sat thru.
Yet this film ranks as one of the most honest and frank music biography movies out on the market, and I urge anyone who stays away from it because of an aversion to Punk and it's offshoots to seek it out ASAP.The acting from Gary Oldman & Chloe Webb is nothing short of amazing, the photography from Roger Deakins is very impressive.........witness a scene as Vicious leaves a New Jersey prison and walks across a deserted scrap heap with New York prominent in the background, the twin towers cloaked in cloud .
I personally believe at least part of the discomfort comes from the fact that at some level, we DO understand Sid and Nancy, their love for each other, and the choices they make beneath the haze of addiction.I realize, seeing it with adult eyes, why my parents were so shocked I was watching this film in 1987.
The supporting cast deserves accolades as well - in particular, Andrew Schofield turns in a seamless portrayal of Johnny Rotten, who, unlike Sid, knows full well Malcolm MacLaren created him.Having read "And I Don't Want To Live This Life" by Debora Spungen, and having seen more than a handful of documentaries with live footage of the band throughout the years, what impressed me most was the consistency of tone that Oldman and Webb bring to their performances.
The movie's ending was unique among biopics where the truth is in dispute, in that it did not profess to know the answer to that burning question (did Sid kill Nancy?) any more than Sid knew himself.Why watch a film about a couple of junkies who came from unremarkable backgrounds and disappeared into the bleakness of drug addiction?
The brilliant performances of Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb in the title roles propel this bleak and depressing look into the calamitous relationship between Sex Pistols bass player Sid Vicious and American punk rock groupie Nancy Spungen.
These are two tortured souls in communion who seem at odds with just about every facet of society -- even the extreme punk rock counter-culture to which they both ostensibly belong.A major problem with the film (and all the more reason to tip our hats to the two leads) is that Sid and Nancy are written as such abrasive and disagreeable characters, one is hard pressed to relate to them on any meaningful level.And while the re-creation of their reckless and volatile rebelliousness is quite detailed and credible, we never get a sense of how they came to be so angry and tortured to begin with.
I think there are moments of visual poetry in this film, I think Gary Oldman's performance is excellent, but the script is a Hollywood hackneyed attempt to reduce the Sex Pistols to every stereotype and narrow prejudice those who were never punks have always harbored about the punk movement.
I was pleasantly surprised to find a coherent, energetic but ultimately melancholy study of co-dependency, with two terrific central performances.We get to know Chloe Webb's child-woman Nancy to a greater extent than we do Gary Oldman's wild-man Sid. Not the actors' fault.
Recent social history is very hard to capture through drama and Alex Cox must be grateful to have such a good plot device (a far from standard love story) to carry us through this difficult and much misunderstood period of history.Punk rock was born to be a cult.
A life consisting of drugs, sex and TV - often consumed all at the same time.Alex Cox's direction (possibly because he knew the punk movement first hand rather than through the papers) is first rate - like Quentin Tarantino lite - but he is  just as much a flash-in-the-pan as Sid and Nancy himself.
This vivid recreation of the last, not quite desperate days of Sex Pistol Sid Vicious and his junkie/lover Nancy Spungen celebrates all the pathetic excesses of punk rock anarchy, but without the overwrought clichés Oliver Stone would later use to embalm kindred rock martyr Jim Morrison.
Gary Oldman brilliantly captures the ignorant anger (and sometimes disarming innocence) of the man described by Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren as a "fabulous disaster", and Chloe Webb is equally fine as the ugly duckling drug addict Nancy..
If you just watch the movie as the story of two tragic lovers and don't compare it to reality it's alright; I liked it a lot when I was a 14-year-old punk, heh.
I last saw this movie when it came out in the mid-1980s, and as a long-time aficionado of punk rock, one had to say that 'Sid and Nancy' was awful.
Check 'The Punk Rock Movie'; Sid actually could play, albeit in a basic 'Dee Dee Ramone' manner, and if you'd like to listen to the live bootlegs, they bear little resemblance to the incompetent racket served up by the 'Sex Pistols' in 'S & N'.
Gary Oldman, good actor that he is, does his best impersonation of Sid's lugubrious, cockney drawl but he's a little too healthy looking, in truth.Even as a depiction of 1977, the film fails to convince.
This starts with the death of Nancy Spungen (Chloe Webb) leaving Sid Vicious (Gary Oldman) catatonic as the police question him.
Interestingly, John Lydon also describes himself as being the only talented member of the Sex Pistols, and this is borne out by his musical output after their breakup, so it would be interesting to see a biopic about him.Not having seen any original footage or performances of the real Sid Vicious, I am not going to comment on whether Gary Oldman captures the character or not.
When people tell me they don't make films like Sid And Nancy anymore, I think it's a damned shame..
Alex Cox got the basic details correct: Sid and Nancy were low-life junkies; Sid was a replacement bass player for the Sex Pistols and couldn't play a lick; everyone hated Nancy; they lived in squalor; Sid ended up on Riker's Island, and Nancy ended up dead on a bathroom floor.Nearly every other detail in the movie was terribly inaccurate, everything from Sid and Nancy first meeting to how Nancy was positioned when she was found dead.
Sex Pistols bassist and Punk Rock icon Sid Vicious (Gary Oldman, in a staggering performance) is being questioned by police about the apparent murder of his girlfriend and world famous rock n' roll groupie Nancy Spungen (Chloe Webb, Twins, TV's China Beach).
After a brief first encounter there is no chemistry between these two classic lovers, but soon Nancy sees Sid at a Sex Pistols gig, jumping around on stage freely showing his lack of musical ability and its love at first sight.
The problem, unfortunately, is the protagonists.Although Oldman and Webb are very good in their roles, ultimately the film suffers from the fact that neither Sid Vicious nor Nancy Spungen were especially sympathetic figures.
Oldman, Webb and Schofield are fantastic as Sid, Nancy and Rotten alike and it's invigorating to watch the cast sing, spit and curse their way through the Pistols back catalogue.
Love and Cobain would end up being one of those tragic couples like Sid and Nacy, and John and Yoko.Gary Oldman stars as Sid Vicious.
OK, so seeing this film as a young "wanna be" punk-ster in my day I was enthralled by the free living, F the world, "no one cares anyway" lifestyle Sid and Nancy lived.
Watching 'Sid and Nancy' as somebody who has seen her fair share of great biopics and being a huge admirer of Gary Oldman, to me it didn't disappoint at all.
It is unflinching, uncompromising and at times depressing, but it's a riveting watch.Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb are absolutely outstanding in the lead roles, especially Oldman who gives one of his best performances from personal opinion here.
The characters are pretty vile at times but there is enough to make one feel sympathy for them.'Sid and Nancy' is atmospherically filmed and there is a real sense of authenticity to the costumes and setting.
'Sid and Nancy' is a depressing, devastating motion-picture, that works for 2 reasons: Gary Oldman & Chloe Webb.
Both of the actors are Mesmerising in their portrayals.'Sid and Nancy' portrays the life of Sid Vicious, bassist of the seminal punk rock band the Sex Pistols, and his relationship with girlfriend Nancy Spungen.
But anyway, its my all time favorite movie, and very romantic, like the garbage scene, and a good anti drug film too..
This powerful and mesmerising biopic centred around the life and times, and general demise and downward spiral of The Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious and his drug addicted American girlfriend Nancy Spungen is nothing short of harrowing and moving in equal measure.
Writer-director Alex Cox admirably gets a lot of mileage out of the short-but-not-sweet, doomed relationship between real-life British punker Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols and heroin-addict Nancy Spungen, his American girlfriend, played impeccably by Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb.
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.
To me the two standouts of this film was Alex Cox's symbolism and Gary Oldmans incredible( the word incredible just doesnt justify) performance as Sid. I could identify with Sid but not Nancy, and in Sid i saw fleeting glimpses of a scared little boy, lost in a big bad world.
Good acting by Oldman and Webb captured the chaotic drug-infused lifestyle of Sid and Nancy, Most of the time it was hard to watch their self-destructiveness which knew would end badly.
Sid and NancyLike EDM musicians, Hip-Hop artists and Pop vocalists, Punk rockers can make millions without ever knowing how to play a musical instrument.Case in point, the maladroit bassist in this drama.At the height of the Sex Pistols' popularity, crusty punker Sid Vicious (Gary Oldman) is introduced to American groupie Nancy Spungen (Chloe Webb).
The volatile union inevitably destroys the band before terminating the star-crossed lovers themselves in true punk fashion.While Oldman's acting début manages to electrify, auteur Alex Cox' 1986 adaptation of the 1978 events marginalizes lead singer Rotten's importance in the band's success, while glamourizing Vicious' drug abuse and his bad musicianship.
These two perfectly embody the Sid and Nancy we "knew." It's a great film to watch for style inspiration as well- fashion, art, music.
style) with a dead person and then tells the story of how they got there.The dead woman is Nancy Spungen, paramour of Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious (Gary Oldman).
Oldman's punk rock appearance looks so much like the real Sid Vicious, it's uncanny.
Sid and Nancy lived like pigs, one scene has them sitting up in bed, accepting their fate as they watch their hotel room go up in flames, played to a haunting music score.
This is the Story of Sid and Nancy and not of Punk Rock or the Sex Pistols.
Don't let the Movie put you off Punk Rock because it doesn't Portray the Essential Energy, Evolution, or Embryonic Essence of the Music and the Movement.It is a Great Film but can be a Hard Watch at Times.
Being this way I don't particularly enjoy seeing a realistic portrayal of a life of a person who is a violent junkie living a gutter-like life.I rated this a one because I personally believe movies should be entertaining unless they're rated educational, and I don't think this is.However based on what you find entertaining you may feel extremely different about this film.
I don't have a problem with anyone making a film about a love affair between two down-and-out junkies, but the heroin chic of some scenes (particularly the one where Sid&Nancy are kissing on some alley, while sickly-sweet sentimental music plays and garbage falls out of the sky) made me sick.
Is taking heroin and throwing your life away really so cool and romantic?The first half of the film is actually not that bad, but as soon as the Pistols break up and Nancy shows up and starts her screeching, all we are left with are with endless fighting and screaming, followed by tearful reconciliation and (god forbid) sex scenes.
The story itself is more focused on the self-destructive life of Sid Vicious, who was the popular bass player of this group and his girlfriend Nancy Spungen (played by Chloe Webb).
As Sex Pistols' bassist Sid Vicious and his junkie/groupie girlfriend Nancy Spungen, Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb do such a chillingly good job of climbing inside the roles and reliving their pitifully wasted lives, that documentary footage (available on the Criterion DVD version) is that much more eerie to watch, making it seem as if they were channeling the very souls of these damned and doomed lovers, rather than just role-playing.Perhaps a larger part of the tragedy of this story is that in the telling, the audience never really does come to understand what the hell all the fuss was about, as if being a part of the punk movement wasn't so much a way of making a statement about rebellion against anything specific, as it was against living life itself; embracing the doctrine of "live fast, die young and leave a beautiful corpse," with the "beauty" part completely ripped from the equation.In spite of the overall bleakness of the subject matter, director Cox does manage to throw in several stunning visuals and set pieces; scenes that have the startling effect of suddenly finding a sunflower growing from a pile of dog feces.
Gary Oldman is on superb form as punk icon, Sid Vicious, with Chloe Webb being just as good, as the screwed-up New York junkie, Nancy Spungen.
I definitely agree with others on here, the book "And I don't wanna live this life" by Nancy's mother, Deborah, is a powerful look into her daughter and the effects of drugs and Sid had on a great deal of people.
If Nancy Spungen was anything at all like Chloe Webb portrays her here, it's no wonder Sid Vicious stabbed her to death.
But then what is the point of filming this if not to remind us of how great and important the band seemed to contemporaries?Sid and Nancy is an incredible bummer to watch because it fails to deliver the goods musically and never conveys the frenzied excitement  that greeted the first wave of punk.
(We know it was drugs.) Surely there is some connection to the Sex Pistols' own spectacular act of self-immolation - they lasted less than two years - but the film doesn't provide answers.Gary Oldman comes across more restrained than usual, an odd choice.
Even after he meets Nancy Spungen (Chloe Webb), he still seems like he wants nothing more than to be bad, living the most self-destructive lifestyle imaginable.
While both Sid and Nancy seem real enough, the rest of the band (and their performances) look nothing like the real Sex Pistols.
As such, Oldman makes Sid Vicious out to be the tragic punk, representing the adversity of the then burgeoning neo-conservative era.In all, a film worth watching..
Having been a fan of the Sex Pistols and Sid Vicious for only a few months the first time I watched this movie, I took it all as fact, which it clearly is not.
Gary Oldman gives what is probably his most convincing performance as Sid Vicious, the doomed punk rocker.
Chloe Webb is fascinating as the manipulative, manic Nancy and Gary Oldman gives his best performance ever as the talentless, witless Sid Vicious who was lucky (or unlucky) enough to be there at the right time when punk and the Sex Pistols took off.
If I'd seen this film without knowing anything about punk rock, or the lives of sid and nancy I could have probably appreciated this film a lot more.
Where Do I start, this movie has the storyline close to the real facts.The tale of Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen is played brilliantly  by Gary Oldman and, stage actress Chloe Webb.Gary Oldman is highly believable as the punk rocker.But there's something that I can't really put my finger on, all I know is once you've seen this movie, Gary Oldman's charm and Andrew Schofield's(playing Johnny Rotton)dry sarcasm will make you want to watch it over and over again.It's just that good.
I can't recall ever seeing a better feel-bad movie, especially not one with two blistering lead performances like those of Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb.
The story of Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen is a brutally tragic testament to the punk attitude.
The story of Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols and the drug-addicted groupie Nancy Spungen is well-known in popular culture.