BoyTown

I'm not going to say anything much about plot and content - You should see it and I don't want to spoil a minute of it for you.

It's not often you see a movie you can't fault, but "Boytown" is one of them. Great premise, top writing and directing, well acted with the perfect comedy timing you'd expect from this group of Australian (OK, and British ex-pat) veterans. The songs for women of "their generation" had my wife and I rolling in the aisles.

It's a masterpiece of stereotype satire, and an interesting comment on what happens to rockers when they're closer to the rocking chair than the rocking cradle.

The ending was a surprise (although I had been warned by my son), but somehow it seemed like the best way to end and it neatly eliminated any prospect of the pathetic sequel so many American films seem to spawn. Go and see it, and don't listen to the negative reviews - they must have been watching some other movie of the same name.

I waited a long time to watch this film. I did sit though it in one go without losing interest, but it wasn't nearly as enjoyable as I had hoped. Here in the UK I've have been hearing Molloy, Robbins & co on streamed radio for years. They are grossly funny, but this film didn't match up to that level. The funniest part was Molloy's real-life banter with his young 'double' in the extras. And what a waste of Tony Martin. On the other hand, the songs were clever and memorable, Sally Phillips is always super, and I was impressed with Mick's penduluming.

This movie is probably too subtle for its own good. Firstly it satirises boy-band/pop music, which is a fairly easy target, but it also satirises the very genre of 'getting the band back together' type films. Because it plays the cliches it satirises completely straight, at times it appears exactly like the bad movies it parodies. The performances are generally good and, given so earnestly in the face of deliberately cringeworthy dialogue and songs, are a subtle highlight. The predictable and extremely fantastic course the film takes sat somewhere between brilliant satire and mediocre plot development. Still, an enjoyable film with a little more going on than first appears.

I got along to a sneak "mystery" preview screening at Village in Sth Yarra, and almost contemplated leaving when I found out it was a Mick Molloy Australian comedy movie. Boy, was I pleasantly surprised though! If you like The Castle, The Dish or any American MTV rockumentary/music based movies, I'd think you'll enjoy this. Glenn Robbins was great in the lead I thought, in fact all 5 of the boy band were very good. Three bad bits- I thought the closing 3 minutes were among the worst ever seen in Cinema, and really destroyed the enjoyment of the rest of the flick. It was Aussie commercial-TV sketch show bad. (and THAT'S BAD!). The same goes for the ridiculous scene of one of the guys dancing in his underwear... BAD! And one of the songs they sing will probably be offensive to some people.

So, those 3 cringe-worthy moments aside, I think these guys have done a fantastic job.

I left the cinema laughing and enjoyed telling others about the movie, something I haven't done for an Aussie movie in many years (since The Castle, probably!).

When it comes out, check it out and hopefully these flicks will keep improving :)

Being a fan of Mick Molloy I was looking forward to seeing his new movie. Whilst is was good it is not a side splitting fun-fest as expected. There were no snappy lines or any snappy dialogue. I think Mick may have been to busy sharing the writing around to all characters to worry about giving himself (or others) enough funny material. The songs are mildly amusing in an obvious way not in a subtle way ie "Cellulite lady" or "Dishpan hands". "I cry" is more of the subtle variety I expected where you have to listed to the words to get a laugh. There were too many periods of the movie where there were no laughs at all.

Anyway it's certainly not a dud but like so many movies nowadays could have been a lot better. Do we now have to wait another 4 years for his next effort?