FemaleFirst.co.uk: DVD: Awaydays [DVD] [2009]

Awaydays [DVD] [2009]
enlarge	Director: Pat Holden Actors: Nicky Bell, Stephen Graham, Liam Boyle, Lee Battle, Sean Ward Studio: Optimum Home Entertainment Category: DVD List Price: ~~£15.99~~ Buy New: £7.35 as of 23/11/2009 22:40 GMT details You Save: £8.64 (54%) New (15) Used (2) from £4.99 Seller: findprice Rating: 21 reviews Sales Rank: 853 Format: Anamorphic, PAL Language: English (Original Language) Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over Region: 2 Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 Number Of Discs: 1 Running Time: 101 Minutes Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2 Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.4 x 0.6 EAN: 5055201808301 ASIN: B002BD9DG6 Release Date: September 28, 2009 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days


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Customer Reviews: Showing reviews 1-5 of 21 1 2 3 4 5 Next » Independent cinema at it's best! August 13, 2009 R. Barter (London, England) 10 out of 12 found this review helpful If you are expecting Awaydays to be nothing more than a footie violence film along the lines of Green Streets and Football Factory you're very wrong! This is a beautiful coming of age film about two young lads (Elvis Carty), who, in 1979 NW England, find themselves members of "The Pack", a gang of football fans who follow their team across the country (hence the title Awaydays) to cause trouble and fight rival fans. A pure independant British film, a friend of mine put it perfectly when he said "Awaydays doesn't look like a no-budget film as much as it looks like it was actually made in 1979". The film makers have gone to every effort to make the set, costume, haircuts and even the shots and lighting of the film feel like something thats come right out of 1979 (just look at the soundtrack to confirm this!), and as a result Awaydays has achieved something special that it's fellow genre films dont even attempt let alone succeed in doing. There is sex and violence that will appeal to fans of Football Factory etc (it didn't get Nuts film of the week for nothing) but this is also a film that has a depth that any lover of cinema will appreciate. Destined to become a cult classic along with the book, this is possibly this is the first DVD that is a must have for both art students and football fans. Love Will Tear Us Apart... September 8, 2009 Oscar (Merseyside) 5 out of 6 found this review helpful Awaydays is a beautifully crafted love letter to The Pack, a gang of die-hard Tranmere fans searching for identity across the bleak landscape of Merseyside, 1979. br /Our 'heroes', Carty and Elvis, are teenage counterparts, both searching for escape, craving boldness and beauty, but unable to articulate their private yearning amid the harsh language of their everyday lives. br /Carty finds solace with his initiation into a local gang of loveable (!) football hooligans - featuring a stellar performance from Stephen Graham (This is England; Gangs of New York; Snatch) as John Godden. Joining The Pack provides an outlet for Carty's burgeoning masculinity and inherent frustration, not to mention, a new, Casual, wardrobe which sets him apart from his peers. br /Meanwhile, Elvis, the more poetic of the two, creates his own soundtrack of art, music and, of course, despair, which leads the viewer on a heartbreaking journey of lost hope and dying dreams. br /This coming-of-age drama has its feet firmly placed in reality, and a brand new pair of Adidas Samba. Striking performances from newcomers, Nicky Bell (Carty) and Liam Boyle (Elvis), along with a haunting soundtrack, make this film one of the most authentic and original tales of teenage kicks you will find. A retro classic. Sweet and Tender Hooligan September 17, 2009 Millie Dean (Liverpool, England) 5 out of 6 found this review helpful Brilliant, brutal and agonizingly beautiful, Awaydays has to be one of the best British films of the last twenty five years. I haven't read the book so came to this film blind, and after seeing it, I'm reluctant to pick up the novel for fear that it might taint or alter the on screen characters - namely Elvis, Carty, Molly, Robbie, Baby - I fell so deeply in love with. Like all the cinematic greats, Awaydays reveals to us a world that most of us know little about, and perhaps if filtered through the lens of someone less assured, less sensitive than Sampson (writer) and Holden (Director), we might care little about, and it allows us for a brief and wonderful spell of time, to become part of it. Awaydays is something of an oxymoron in that it is both a sweet and tender love story and a story of gang violence. Through the relationship between the two central characters, Carty and Elvis, Awaydays does what all the best drama does - it peels away the truth of the human experience, capturing brilliantly that play off between fatalism and existentialism. It causes us to ask; how much free will do we have as humans? And how much are we bound by the era and the places that we grow up in? Which in this instance is Birkenhead, 1979. One of the things I really love about this film is that, allowing for the obvious sartorial and music references, the social and political backdrop of this period is not flagged up in the usual clichéd manner. There are no cuts to lengthening dole queues or NF riots, it is much more cunning than that and we are grounded in time and place through character and narrative. For example Carty comments on how clever the NF logo is and refers to their appropriation of a pretty, blonde poster girl for their campaign in the run up to the 1979 election. There are no needles, no shots of smack scarred council estates, but rather the heroin epidemic that gripped the country and ravaged Birkenhead during the Thatcher years is portrayed through Elvis' tragic and inevitable downfall and the growing tension between Godden and Baby Milan. Sampson's confidence in his audience allows him to tell the story as originally and authentically as possible. There are no blundering justifications as to why Carty is drawn to them in the first place, no dot-to-dot deconstructions of Elvis` sexuality and Carty`s acceptance and denial of it. It's an intelligent film but it's told simply, told with guts, told with soul. I can't wait to see what will follow. br / Awaydays DVD 2009 October 2, 2009 Nifty (Wirral, Merseyside) 2 out of 2 found this review helpful Awaydays leads us through a teenager's journey into a brutal world of football violence. Still grieving following his mother's death, Carty gets sucked into a world that excites him for its hard an unforgiving rules. The fight scenes are just how they were in the late 70s/early 80s with the Stanley boys, and the sound track is brilliant. Joy Division, John Foxx's Ultravox (not the insipid Midge Ure genre), The Cure, it doesn't get any better than this. You've got to buy this DVD. If you don't buy it, what are you spending your money on that could possibly be better? The 1st Post Punk Classic October 31, 2009 stelly (merseyside) 2 out of 2 found this review helpful I would have given this four stars a while back, but the more you watch it the more it burns into your head. br / br /Great vintage look, great fashion ( so accurate! ), stunning soundtrack and two of the best movie debuts you are ever going to see. Liam Boyle is magnetic as Elvis and so beautiful I'm being to doubt which side of the pitch I'm playing on... br / br /The Dvd extras give you an idea on how much passion has gone into this, couldn't be further from the usual middle class drivel our UK indies usually produce. Showing reviews 1-5 of 21 1 2 3 4 5 Next »

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