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With: Gary Oldman, Chloe Webb, David Hayman, Debby Bishop, Andrew Schofield, Xander Berkeley, Perry Benson, Tony London, Sandy Baron, Sy Richardson, Edward Tudor-Pole, Biff Yeager, Courtney Love
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Written by: Alex Cox, Abbe Wool
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Directed by: Alex Cox
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MPAA Rating: R
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Running Time: 112
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Date: 05/01/1986
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Love Kills
By Jeffrey M. Anderson
Well before biopics became a yearly staple at the Oscars, Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb gave astonishing performances as British punk rocker Sid Vicious and his American girlfriend Nancy Spungen in this film by Alex Cox. Cox directs with an energy and abandon worthy of its subject, forgoing factoids in favor of moments (many fans and some of the band members expressed their outrage).
The film reaches its heights when the Sex Pistols perform (music provided here by an amalgamation of the Clash and the Pogues) and its lows when the hapless pair wither out on various drugs (you can feel their wooziness and despair). Amazingly, despite the downward spiral of these two lives, the film never loses its drive or passion; it never wallows in the misery.
To that end, it contains many quotable lines, and like Cox's Repo Man, has become a cult classic. A then-unknown Courtney Love auditioned for the role of Nancy, but won a smaller role instead.
In 2017, the Criterion Collection dropped one of their must-own Blu-ray releases, a masterpiece in its own right. Aside from brightened-up picture and a thrilling audio track, it includes two previously-recorded commentary tracks, one by screenwriter Abbe Wool, actors Gary Oldman and Choe Webb, critic Greil Marcus, filmmakers Julien Temple and Lech Kowalski, and musician Eliot Kidd, and a second one by Alex Cox and actor Andrew Schofield.
The many extras include vintage documentaries, specifically a generous clip from D.O.A.: A Rite of Passage, a new interview with Cox, archival footage, and a phone interview with Vicious. The liner notes feature an essay by Jon Savage and material assembled by Cox.
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