BoyTown, Kevin Carlin, Film Review: Cinephilia

Synopsis: Benny G (Glenn Robbins), the frontman for BoyTown, a hit '80s boy band, decides to give fame and fortune another call. The boys get together and head for the top.

Given the potential for an unmitigated disaster, BoyTown is a generally likeable comedy that from an unpromising beginning wins one over before throwing a curve ball ending that seems both artistically and commercially perverse.

Based on a sketch idea by Molloy's fellow comedian Glenn Robbins (and used on Molloy's short lived TV comedy series), as a feature film the concept has more than a few whiskers. Boy bands are by their nature ephemeral entities and locked in a certain, largely forgettable, time of their fans' lives. The idea of their resurgence two decades later doesn’t stick, particularly as Molloy and his fellow cast members are too wrinkled and misshapen by age even to play 40 year olds. Thus the first part of the film, in which the boys attempt to reproduce their former selves is suitably wince-inducingly bad but not particularly funny because of the lack of credibility.

Fortunately the film shifts gear when the lads realize that they need to grow up and sing about issues relevant to their fan base. They start writing songs with titles like Cellulite Lady and the spirit of the film rises to celebrate their success as they embark upon their "Love Handles" World Tour. This is still not particularly funny but it is good-humoured and good-hearted enough to keep a smile on your face. Had Molloy and his brother Richard kept to this trajectory the film would probably enjoy quite a satisfactory reception although nothing of the order of Molloy’s 2002 hit, Crackerjack. Inexplicably, the film shifts gear yet again in some kind of self-immolating fantasy that yanks the characters out of the identifiable mundanity that provides their and the film's charm and returns it to the realm of spoof, with which, fairly unsuccessfully, it began.

Whilst not setting the world on fire, BoyTown is well-enough made, with excellent production values, a solid script, good performances (UK actress Sally Phillips is a winning presence and Glenn Robbins with his familiar self-deprecating manner is as good as ever) and a steady directorial hand affording an unusually high quotient of cinematic satisfaction for a comedy, homegrown or otherwise.