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Plot – Mark Hunter (Slater) has recently been forced to relocate to Arizona from the East Coast. His parents give him a short-wave radio so that he can keep in touch with his old friends. Except that Mark uses it for very different reasons. During the day at school Mark is a shy, reserved student but at night he becomes the anarchic pirate DJ, Happy Harry Hard-on. Things go much further than Mark could ever have imagined however, as his rantings make him a cult hero amongst his fellow students (who have no idea of his true identity) and a poison in the eyes of teachers and parents. When he inspires scenes of chaos at school, and when one of his listeners commits suicide a media frenzy swirls up and the authorities are called in to put a stop to the broadcasts.
Up front I have to admit that I don't believe I had ever heard of this film before signing up to the forum. After discovering that it was a real favourite of a number of members on the site (Honeykid, Sexy Celebrity, Used Future, TylerDurden99 etc) I felt I had to track it down and give it a shot. And I'm glad I did. It proved to be a highly entertaining angst powered teen anthem. To flesh this review out I thought I'd do a little something different. Part of Pump Up the Volume entails Christian Slater's character talking about his life and his problems, and encouraging listeners to do the same by either writing or phoning in. So I thought I'd talk about my teenage years and school days a bit, and try to relate it to the film.
Pump Up the Volume shows that for a whole lot of people their school days were not in fact the 'greatest time of your life' as so many TV shows and films would lead you to believe. And I was certainly one of those people. Truth is I'm kinda f**ked up!
I suffer from social phobia and have done for my whole life basically. The place that really precipitated that was certainly at school. Every morning before school I would be in the bathroom feeling sick and every day was just an immense struggle. It got to the point where it was making my whole life miserable, and making me so depressed that I even considered taking the most drastic of actions. I was saved from that when at 14/15 it just got too much and I was advised to stop going to school. From then on I just studied at home with tutors popping in every so often. Was still a very tough time though even after that so I could certainly appreciate the struggles of the students in this film, even if the problems may not have been the same; I departed school before immense peer pressure over drugs and sex etc began to rear its head.
I felt the film was very successful at providing a snapshot of being a teenager, at portraying the highs and lows of teenage life. At that age when something bad happens in your life it's the worst thing ever! I mean it's the absolute end of the world! And yet on the flipside, the things that you love - you really love, and become incredibly important to you. In a lot of the cases the music, the films and the books that you absorb in this time mean more to you than anything else ever will. It's where you formulate who you are and what you like. It also shows how important it is to find that 'voice' that really talks to you at that age. The 'voice' that feels its talking right to you. For these kids it's turning on their radios and listening to Happy Harry Hard-on. For me it was sitting in my room listening to the songs of Nirvana on repeat over and over, listening to Kurt Cobain talk directly to me. Or so it felt at the time. Oh and the film also takes the time to throw in a touch of satire about how the media can whip up a frenzy over a story and blow it all out of proportion. They take the suicide of a student that listened to Harry's show, and instead of examining what was going in his life to drive him to such lengths, they turn it into an attack on Harry and the kids in general, talking about how dangerous they are. It's very easy to see the links to attacks on movies, video games and rap music when some outrage occurs.
While I don't imagine I've seen a huge number of his films, Christian Slater is an actor I've always really enjoyed watching. I've always been quite taken by his edgy intensity; and that edgy, spiky demeanour that he appears to naturally possess makes him a perfect fit for the role of Mark 'Hard Harry' Hunter. Indeed in many ways the Hard Harry persona of his character fells rather similar to the role of J.D., the character that Slater memorably portrayed in the wonderful pitch-black comedy, Heathers. Except that here he isn't quite as homicidal! In a way Slater actually plays two characters here; the shy, withdrawn Mark Hunter that barely a single person notices, and then his manic alter ego, Happy Harry Hard-on. His Mark is very one-note, and it doesn't really seem to fit Slater all that well. As Happy Harry however he is fantastic! His on-air performance is fantastically wild, jumping manically from smooth-talking ladies man to a raging revolutionary in the blink of an eye. It really is Slater's intensity and charisma that drives the film. The great power and passion he puts into his dialogue heavy on-air speeches are great fun, and really stirred the anti-establishment anarchist in me!
As Mark's love interest, and the sole person to know the truth about him, Samantha Mathis is alluring as hell as Nora. She really is exceptionally sexy in a dangerous, bad girl kind of way. And as someone who very much identified with Mark's shy, geeky side she was the kind of girl you dreamed of. A girl who was really cool to come along, see you for who you were and bring you out of your shell. Admittedly outside of these two some of the acting may not be up to the highest of standards but it doesn't overly hurt the film for me.
As you would hope, and indeed expect from a film about a pirate DJ, Pump Up the Volume proves to have a pretty awesome soundtrack, featuring the likes of The Pixies, Liquid Jesus, Soundgarden and Sonic Youth. The film also features the excellent “Everybody Knows” by Leonard Cohen as Harry's signature song that he kicks off each broadcast with. It's actually the second great film I've seen which features the song prominently; the other being the ace documentary, The King of Kong.
It would actually make for quite a fun double-bill alongside Class of 1984, which I watched a few weeks back. Both films feature a fairly hellish school but points the finger at different individuals; Class of 1984 painted the kids as scum whereas in Pump up the Volume its the teachers who are the problem.
Conclusion - The film may be a little rough around the edges, and appear a bit dated in our internet age, but it's got an honesty and a sincerity about it that I was drawn to. And at least it's a film that attempts to say something. While I still greatly enjoyed this film, I just wish I had seen it back in my mid to late teens. If I had I think I would have absolutely loved it! It would have been one of those I really considered 'my films'.
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Year of release
1990
1990
Directed by
Allan Moyle
Allan Moyle
Written by
Allan Moyle
Allan Moyle
Starring
Chrisian Slater
Samantha Mathis
Mimi Kennedy
Annie Ross
Chrisian Slater
Samantha Mathis
Mimi Kennedy
Annie Ross
Pump Up the Volume
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Plot – Mark Hunter (Slater) has recently been forced to relocate to Arizona from the East Coast. His parents give him a short-wave radio so that he can keep in touch with his old friends. Except that Mark uses it for very different reasons. During the day at school Mark is a shy, reserved student but at night he becomes the anarchic pirate DJ, Happy Harry Hard-on. Things go much further than Mark could ever have imagined however, as his rantings make him a cult hero amongst his fellow students (who have no idea of his true identity) and a poison in the eyes of teachers and parents. When he inspires scenes of chaos at school, and when one of his listeners commits suicide a media frenzy swirls up and the authorities are called in to put a stop to the broadcasts.
Up front I have to admit that I don't believe I had ever heard of this film before signing up to the forum. After discovering that it was a real favourite of a number of members on the site (Honeykid, Sexy Celebrity, Used Future, TylerDurden99 etc) I felt I had to track it down and give it a shot. And I'm glad I did. It proved to be a highly entertaining angst powered teen anthem. To flesh this review out I thought I'd do a little something different. Part of Pump Up the Volume entails Christian Slater's character talking about his life and his problems, and encouraging listeners to do the same by either writing or phoning in. So I thought I'd talk about my teenage years and school days a bit, and try to relate it to the film.
Pump Up the Volume shows that for a whole lot of people their school days were not in fact the 'greatest time of your life' as so many TV shows and films would lead you to believe. And I was certainly one of those people. Truth is I'm kinda f**ked up!
I suffer from social phobia and have done for my whole life basically. The place that really precipitated that was certainly at school. Every morning before school I would be in the bathroom feeling sick and every day was just an immense struggle. It got to the point where it was making my whole life miserable, and making me so depressed that I even considered taking the most drastic of actions. I was saved from that when at 14/15 it just got too much and I was advised to stop going to school. From then on I just studied at home with tutors popping in every so often. Was still a very tough time though even after that so I could certainly appreciate the struggles of the students in this film, even if the problems may not have been the same; I departed school before immense peer pressure over drugs and sex etc began to rear its head.I felt the film was very successful at providing a snapshot of being a teenager, at portraying the highs and lows of teenage life. At that age when something bad happens in your life it's the worst thing ever! I mean it's the absolute end of the world! And yet on the flipside, the things that you love - you really love, and become incredibly important to you. In a lot of the cases the music, the films and the books that you absorb in this time mean more to you than anything else ever will. It's where you formulate who you are and what you like. It also shows how important it is to find that 'voice' that really talks to you at that age. The 'voice' that feels its talking right to you. For these kids it's turning on their radios and listening to Happy Harry Hard-on. For me it was sitting in my room listening to the songs of Nirvana on repeat over and over, listening to Kurt Cobain talk directly to me. Or so it felt at the time. Oh and the film also takes the time to throw in a touch of satire about how the media can whip up a frenzy over a story and blow it all out of proportion. They take the suicide of a student that listened to Harry's show, and instead of examining what was going in his life to drive him to such lengths, they turn it into an attack on Harry and the kids in general, talking about how dangerous they are. It's very easy to see the links to attacks on movies, video games and rap music when some outrage occurs.
Film trivia - Pump up the Volume features a pretty corrupt principal who expels so called 'trouble' students to help the school's grade average. The film's writer/director Allan Moyles based the school, Hubert Humphrey Hugh, on a Montreal high school where his sister used to teach. According to his sister the school had a principal "who had a pact with the staff to enhance the credibility of the school scholastically at the expense of the students who were immigrants or culturally disabled in some way or another."
In a way Slater actually plays two characters here; the shy, withdrawn Mark Hunter that barely a single person notices, and then his manic alter ego, Happy Harry Hard-on. His Mark is very one-note, and it doesn't really seem to fit Slater all that well. As Happy Harry however he is fantastic! His on-air performance is fantastically wild, jumping manically from smooth-talking ladies man to a raging revolutionary in the blink of an eye. It really is Slater's intensity and charisma that drives the film. The great power and passion he puts into his dialogue heavy on-air speeches are great fun, and really stirred the anti-establishment anarchist in me! As Mark's love interest, and the sole person to know the truth about him, Samantha Mathis is alluring as hell as Nora. She really is exceptionally sexy in a dangerous, bad girl kind of way. And as someone who very much identified with Mark's shy, geeky side she was the kind of girl you dreamed of. A girl who was really cool to come along, see you for who you were and bring you out of your shell. Admittedly outside of these two some of the acting may not be up to the highest of standards but it doesn't overly hurt the film for me.
As you would hope, and indeed expect from a film about a pirate DJ, Pump Up the Volume proves to have a pretty awesome soundtrack, featuring the likes of The Pixies, Liquid Jesus, Soundgarden and Sonic Youth. The film also features the excellent “Everybody Knows” by Leonard Cohen as Harry's signature song that he kicks off each broadcast with. It's actually the second great film I've seen which features the song prominently; the other being the ace documentary, The King of Kong.
It would actually make for quite a fun double-bill alongside Class of 1984, which I watched a few weeks back. Both films feature a fairly hellish school but points the finger at different individuals; Class of 1984 painted the kids as scum whereas in Pump up the Volume its the teachers who are the problem.
Conclusion - The film may be a little rough around the edges, and appear a bit dated in our internet age, but it's got an honesty and a sincerity about it that I was drawn to. And at least it's a film that attempts to say something. While I still greatly enjoyed this film, I just wish I had seen it back in my mid to late teens. If I had I think I would have absolutely loved it! It would have been one of those I really considered 'my films'.