Dumped by his Uni girlfriend at Graduation, but stuck with an expensive ticket to a Summer Music Festival, Nick (played with willingness but familiarity by Joe Thomas) and his best friend Shane (Hammed Animashaun) head for a weekend of music, drugs and mud 'somewhere ..... somewhere in a field in Hampshire .... Alright'.
Following on from the teenage grossout-embarrassment comedy trend that was reignited by the likes of "The Inbetweeners" "The Festival" is a collection of sex, pain and bodily function jokes stretched over a fairly basic plot about a character too self-absorbed to see how he sabotages all the relationships in his life. You can probably already know if this is for you or not, so what can I tell you if you're still considering it? Well, if you're in the right mood, it's was a reasonable time. There were a few laughs to be had, particularly from Jermaine Clement cameoing as Shane's mothers over familiar boyfriend and as you might imagine with some of the surprising bits of unsophisticated gags did warrant a laugh, or at least a groan. They actually did a good job of keeping many of the jokes out of the trailers but as can often be the case with comedies, realistically it's got one viewing and then it's done. I don't think I'll ever need to see it again, and if I do it won't be anything like as amusing.
As many of the other reviews have pointed out one of the films worst failings though is familiarity. Joe Thomas is essentially playing the same character he does in both "The Inbetweeners" and "Fresh Meat" and similar things can be said for Noel Fielding and Nick Frost in their cameos. It does then fall to the less familiar stars, Hammed Animashaun and Claudia O'Doherty, as Nutty Australian Amy - to offer something new, which they do with a couple of nice B-Story plots that help keep the film ticking over.
Fun whilst it lasts, but instantly forgettable and not worth revisiting.
