Well, of course Morrissey wants to be as far away from that hideous film as possible. It represents everything Moz detests: the triumph of the daft and shallow. The Happy Mondays especially were completely empty-headed fools, and certainy not deserving of any attention whatsoever 13 years on.

I can only think of one word when reading this, A-S-S-H-O-L-E!

He should have let them keep him in, the film would have benefited from a wider perpective on the Manchester music scene of that time rather than concentrating on Joy Division & the Happy Mondays. Sounds like Morrissey just suffers from a dispositon whereby he feels the need to put a spanner in the works of everything!

Morrissey's ever brilliant intuition has come to his rescue yet again. Once he got the prescient notion that Winterbottom's film was going to be one of the biggest crocks of crap ever made, he pulled out in the 11th hour.

I went to see this piece of celluloid junk on Friday and it really is just marginally more palatable than the equally execrable 'Velvet Goldmine'- that was incidently produced by that lyrically and follically challenged rawk&roll crooner and sometime friend of Mozzy, Mickel Stoop of Rapid Eye Movement.

Posted elsewhere in this site, it says how sad that the Morrissey's "cameo" was cut from the film. Sad! Well I'm not sad, I'm bloody relieved that The Smiths have absolutely no link whatsoever with this truly awful film whatsoever.

The Smiths were in a league of their of own, and certainly well outside Shaun 'smackhead/methadone' Ryder's eternal orbit of gun toting, charlie sniffing party pooping people. Although they come from the same neck of the woods, Morrissey and Ryder&Co are poles apart in practically every way imaginable. Personally I don't think Morrissey would have survived an association with this film - a film that will make him rightly cringe with embarassment if/when he sees it.

This film is worth a look if only to realize that Morrissey was a brave soul not to get involved with the sleezy drug&guns culture of the 80's Manchester. Fortunately for us, he never quite fitted in with the scuzzball violent illiterate smack heads like Bez and the Ryder brothers, nor with the run of the cotton mill averageness of Tony 'TWAT' Wilson's Factory Records (thank Christ The Smiths signed with Rough Trade!) and the New Order/Electronic/Hacienda 'E' gang. The fact Wilson found Mozzy 'too bookish' to welcome into the Factory fold, was indeed both a compliment and a blessing in retrospect.

Like a REAL REAl man, it was freshly cut daffodils&violets, endless rounds of Fondant Fancies and cups of Gold Blend tea, readings of Elizabeth Smart's lyric poetry, along with regular visits to Southern Cemetery with local eccentric Linder Sterling that Our Steven Patrick got all into a frothy lather about. He was the Prince amidst the peasant swine of Madchester at the start of the 80's. If that sounds harsh well that's how I see it after seeing this wretched film.

Morrissey was just too inteligent, too cultured and ultimately too dignified and dare I say monkish for these self loathing, musically challenged artless drug fuelled bastards. I cannot think of one song by the Happy Mondays that will be remembered for eternity. Objectively speaking New Order will always be remembered for at least 'Blue Monday'. Joy Division will be remembered for being at least original with their outdoor snare sound and for Ian Curtis, a modern day John the Baptist type, who in his short life paved a way for Morrissey's prophetic and melancholy musings.

The Mondays, with all their cultural handicaps, just made music as a crap soundtrack to their hedonistic filthy debauchery. They weren't the slightest bit interested in their audience/fans. The music was dated as soon as it was played on the DAT machine at record the company meeting. They have absolutely no worth whatsoever in terms of popular music culture. After this film ends up in the bargain basement video basket, they will soon be forgotten forever.

Furthermore, we also realize that from this film that the easy temptation of drugs/sex/debauchery was too much for Johnny Marr, and that's why he went off to make sickly sweet muzak with Bernard Summers/Matt Johnson/Neil Tennant et all. Ditto Andy Rourke. At least Joyce and Rourke admired and respected Morrissey's unique take on life and enjoyed working with him in The Smiths.

Joy Division were reasonably interesting, but its totally embarassing to see a film milk a great song like 'Love Will Tear Us Apart' for all its worth. Its repeated at least six times in the throughout the film.

If you're at all curious about this rubbish just wait f

Read the rest of this comment...

Sometimes Morrissey is so boring....

This piece from Eagle featuring Dan Dare (see the talking shrimp on the cover given away as a free gift) claims that Chris Quentin refused permission for the use of his bathroom carpet to be made into dungarees and so any scenes with him throttling a gnome were dropped !!!
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The film is great. Mark E Smith is great in it, Dave Gorman as John The Postman is great in it. The Hacienda was wonderfully recreated. Howard Devoto was wonderful everyone was great and so was the film and the music. I love the recreation of the Sex Pistols gig and Joy Division gigs. Truely the dogs bollocks.

I only wish that they focused on Frank Sidebottom and Little Frank as they were the real force behind the Manchester music scene. But alas they were completely ignored.

If you dont like this film then you are a twat.

How can you make a movie about the Manchester scene of the 80's without including Moz or the Smiths? It's like writng a book about English literature without mentionning Shakespeare! It's a bloody disgrace!

I would very much enjoy to have a Morrissey song in my film that I am currently editing on the Mac that I use to type this as we speak. I've even sent faxes to his management.
His music can be very filmic!
As for having someone act as him, it sounds like Julia Roberts playing Erin Brokovich. Although I really have no love for Julia or Erin, Julia does not come close to Erin, she's just Julia. Moz should do the cameo himself. But why would he do this when they aren't paying him? The only reason would be a good script. These people were probably afraid of their script, but not afraid to make the film. A screenplay is a map for a film to be made - having some suckered upstart and badly cast(I've seen the pictures) guy make a fake Moz cameo is a lame excuse for not being able to find the actual Moz in that map.

For example, I would not write Thom Yorke to play at my party into my script. I couldn't afford it, and I couldn't replicate it with anything cheap. Not only that, it wouldn't have anything to do with my story!