Brilliant Satire from Morris and Brooker (Nathan Barley (DVD))

Member Name: paulie1975

Product:	Nathan Barley (DVD)
Date:	17/06/09 (21 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great characters and characterisations, looks great

Disadvantages: No Second Series......What a Shame!

Nathan Barley is a really funny mickey take of the Hoxton set, written by the incomparable Chris Morris (Brasseye, Day Today) and the acidic Charlie Brooker (Screenwipe, Guardian Tv reviewer), this is about the media set and shows how the people who influence what we watch, listen to, read and think are actually mental!!

Main Characters:

Nathan Barley - Nicholas Burns - Nathan is a guerrilla film-maker, webmaster, DJ, entrepreneur and "self facilitating media node", his description of himself sums Barley up, he is extremely self facilitating and totally in love with himself, he follows all the latest trends to the point of ridiculousness and is so frightened of not being on-trend that he is tragically uncool.

Dan "Preacher Man" Ashcroft - Julian Barrett - The hero or anti-hero of the piece, Dan can see that everyone around him is a pretentious fool and is upset and world weary at the shallow pointlessness of it all, however he is also a gambler and a bit of a boozer so has to write for 'Sugarape' the local bible of cool to maintain his lifestyle and is therefore feeding the industry he despises so much. His writing is aggressive and destructive as is his personality. Barratt captures this character perfectly a normal person in a world of idiots, or an idiot in a world of idiots, you decide.

Claire Ashcroft - Claire Keelan - Claire is Dan's little sister, she is smart enough to see through the ridiculous wannabe's around her. She is a film maker desperate to make hard hitting documentaries about junkies and the hard life but is hindered by Nathan trying to funk up her video or seduce her.

Pingu - Ben Whishaw - Nathan's nervous flatmate, his dive out of the window is legendary, absolutely hilarious, youtube it. Ben Wishaw has subsequently become an international film star, but in this he is excellent as the timid Pingu.

Ned Smanks - Richard Ayoade - The fantastic Ayoade is a Sugarape writer and professional idiot, knowing and unknowing in the same sentence he is a befuddled cool mess. Ayoade is excellent.

The show:

The show follows Nathan Barley but he is at times peripheral as Dan is the guy we relate to a hopeless failure who can see through the ridiculousness of the outwardly cool neighbours and workmates.

The show is very funny taking the mickey out of the digital media industry and the people within it, having spent a lot of time around Hoxton I can spot a lot of the characters in this show and it really does mercilessly goad these types, although feedback I received was that the people it was mocking really didn't get that it was about them and therefore thought it was utterly hilarious!

Nathan is obnoxious, he is totally self-confident but we often see through it in episodes such as the one where he tries to copy a hungover dan's haircut, the haircut Dan got having fell asleep under a falling tub of paint and then only getting half his haircut before accidentally stabbing a cat!!!

The show is surreal and cutting, there is utterly ridiculous speak, almost another language, but it's a form for cool idiots to communicate and is very funny, Brooker and Morris really get to the heart of the industry and Barratt is excellent as Dan, he is world weary and wants an escape but he always seems to be drawn back into the fold by his pay packet.

Other episodes involve Nathan getting involved with a schoolgirl, Dan betting on tramp fighting and Dan becoming a messiah for the cool set with his critical columns.

The show looks great, is very funny and knowing and is a really biting satire on the ridiculousness of wanting to be cool.

The show was on channel 4 and there are often comments about it having a second series, it would be brilliant if it did but I doubt such brilliance can be repeated.

Summary: Brilliant Satire from Morris and Brooker