Review of Pump Up the Volume (2001) by Joe B — 01 Mar 2011

Following on from his career best performance in Heathers, Christian Slater attempted to live up to his "new Jack Nicholson" status by starring in this very good teen thriller. Although not as bitingly sharp as Heathers, PUTV still manages to spill it's teen angst milkshake all over the place with some flavourable results.

Slater is the effortlessly cool pirate DJ by night and the anonymous nerd by day who can't talk to the ladies and had no friends before he leads the mis-guided youths of Arizona on a tirade of.....well, actually they just park their cars and smoke a bit. Throw in a teen suicide and bit of plot about school corruption to give the film a back bone and this turns out to be quite a lot of fun.

Slater is impressive. His DJ character is given a whole bucket full of "what does it all mean" musings, the kind of stuff that does sound immensely cool when you're 16 years old, as well as a good few moments of humour. He manages to convey the two sides of his character well and has a good chemistry with Winona Ryder's replacement in the movie, Samantha Mathis. The supporting adult cast of teachers are all good too. If the plot may be a little flat, they all help keep the film rolling.

One thing Pump Up The Volume definitely has though is one of the best rock soundtracks to a movie. MC5, Soundgarden, Sonic Youth, The Descendents, The Pixies and The Beastie Boys can all be heard in the film and it's a truly magnificent collection.

PUTV is a film that was of it's time. It's hard to believe the young masses of Arizona rising up at the behest of a pirate DJ in the internet age. At one point, Slater's character muses that everything has been done and everyone is waiting for the next big thing to come along. Well, it did, it was called the internet and facebook.

Relevance in the current climate aside though, PUTV is a very enjoyable movie with a great lead performance and some kick ass music going on.