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Kneecap

What an oddly brilliant film this is. The Northern Irish hip-hop trio, Kneecap, have a pretty unusual career. According to my brief research, they currently have two studio albums and one feature film to their credit. Not knowing about these lads, I was surprised to find out that they aren't actors - you wouldn't know by their performances, particularly Liam Ó Hannaidh (stage name, Mo Chara). He's a standout. The film gives us a presumably fudged version of the band's origins - Mo and best mate, Móglaí Bap (Naoise Ó Cairealláin) have known each other since they were choir boys but it didn't take long for them to embrace the Belfast rave and drug culture, as well as the strong anti-British, anti-RUC feeling among sections of the Catholic community in the north of Ireland. Northern Ireland! North of Ireland! Northern Ireland!

One night, Mo is arrested at a rave and refuses to speak English to the 'peelers' (police), so an interpreter is called in, high school music teacher JJ (JJ Ó Dochartaigh - soon to be DJ Próvai). Snaffling Mo's notebook of thoughts and scribbles (and tabs of acid), JJ realises these words would make good lyrics and so sets about encouraging the lads to lay down some tracks in his poky garage. Central to the music and the film is the steadfast commitment to saving and promoting the Irish language. A poorly attended gig at an uncle's pub is filmed and word starts spreading about this group that couldn't give a fock. Soon they're attracting lots of attention, the good AND bad kind.

Writer/director Rich Peppiatt, by design or accident, has riffed on a host of likeminded films - obviously Trainspotting, but also Good Vibrations, Sing Street and most interestingly, Kneecap plays like a grubbier, slightly ruder version of The Commitments (there's even a reworking of Jimmy Rabbitte's iconic "say it once and say it loud" speech). The film is full of verve, it's very funny in parts, and really fast-paced too. Peppiatt doesn't mind fiddling with animation, screen graffiti, slow-mo and freeze frames - he's very much turning this out as a feature length video clip (are they called that any more?).

The dramatic additions to the story of the band include a Protestant sometime girlfriend, Georgia (an excellent Jessica Reynolds); a nemesis in the peelers, Detective Ellis (Josie Walker); a splinter group of Republicans, the RRAD (Radical Republicans Against Drugs); and Móglaí's absent father, Arló - a fantastic turn by Michael Fassbender (the scene of him in a hoodie staring from the crowd, surrounded by loads of jumping youth is priceless).

Whether you're a hip-hop fan or not, this film is well worth the watch for its energy, piss-taking and fired-up politics of rebellion. One of the year's best.

Kneecap opens at Luna and Palace cinemas on Thursday Aug 29th.

See also:

Alan Parker's The Commitments (1991) is a southern Irish cracker, and Good Vibrations (2012), directed by Lisa Barros D'Sa and Glenn Leyburn, is another good Belfast-set music biopic.

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