I had the opportunity of seeing this film at the London Film Festival and as I grew up in the 1970s, it seemed like an interesting premise.
Sadly, 'Whatever Happened to Harold Smith' is another in a long line of British cinema disasters and is destined to be lambasted by the critics and ignored by the public.
The makers of this film are so lazy that they feel that stringing together a bunch of cultural references around a shallow and uninteresting story and adding a big soundtrack is enough for a surefire success. Well, despite the ridiculously sycophantic applause of Saturday night's audience, the release in February or March will illustrate that this is simply not good enough.
The performances are passable although Stephen Fry does little more than play himself and the lead actor is so inconsequential that I can barely remember his performance.
However, it is the cultural references that really grate - these include a car painted like Starsky and Hutch's, not one but two examples of Hai Karate adverts, a ridiculous take off of the opening of Saturday Night Fever and a variety of newsreaders from the period clearly appearing 20 years too old. It's remarkable that they didn't manage to squeeze spangles in somewhere.
However, the single worst thing about this film is the way that it portrays punks as criminals or deadbeats. Having been a disaffected youth into this music myself, I don't recognise these characters at all and this moral line on a little rebellion leaves a very nasty taste indeed.
Sadly, 'Whatever Happened to Harold Smith' is another in a long line of British cinema disasters and is destined to be lambasted by the critics and ignored by the public.
The makers of this film are so lazy that they feel that stringing together a bunch of cultural references around a shallow and uninteresting story and adding a big soundtrack is enough for a surefire success. Well, despite the ridiculously sycophantic applause of Saturday night's audience, the release in February or March will illustrate that this is simply not good enough.
The performances are passable although Stephen Fry does little more than play himself and the lead actor is so inconsequential that I can barely remember his performance.
However, it is the cultural references that really grate - these include a car painted like Starsky and Hutch's, not one but two examples of Hai Karate adverts, a ridiculous take off of the opening of Saturday Night Fever and a variety of newsreaders from the period clearly appearing 20 years too old. It's remarkable that they didn't manage to squeeze spangles in somewhere.
However, the single worst thing about this film is the way that it portrays punks as criminals or deadbeats. Having been a disaffected youth into this music myself, I don't recognise these characters at all and this moral line on a little rebellion leaves a very nasty taste indeed.