Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll.

Sex and drugs and rock and roll. Is all my brain and body need. Sex and drugs and rock and roll. Are very good indeed. The immortal words of the Billericay Bard. There are more than enough reasons to be cheerful watching Andy Serkis become Ian Dury in the film Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll (2010). I’ll quote Phillip French because I think he sums up Serkis’s performance in his review of this mesmerising film ‘What holds the film together is the performance of Andy Serkis. His resemblance to Dury is simple uncanny, both in appearance, the body language, the growling voice and the singing. More important, though, is the way he captures Dury’s mercurial nature, the contradictions of his character and the uncontrollable impulses that drove him’ Serkis does not portray Ian Dury, he becomes Ian Dury, it’s a masterful performance and should have won him the BAFTA for Best Actor. The film covers a period from the late 1960’s to the early 1980’s. Dury’s early life is shown in a series of flashbacks including the crucial episode in his life when, at the age of nine, swimming at Southend on Sea, he contracted the debilitating disease polo. The stories narrative is driven via a series of Ian Dury and the Blockheads greatest hits. Animated interludes and the credit titles are courtesy of the great artist Peter Blake. Blake, best known for the design of the sleeve for the Sgt Peppers album, was one of Dury’s art teachers at the Royal College of Art in the 60’s. I really enjoyed the style of the film; it perfectly suited the story. Lots of British talent on show, but I must say I was impressed, again, with the young Bill Milner ( Son of Rambow, Is Anybody There) who brilliantly portrays Baxter, Dury’s son.