It's All Gone Pete Tong Film Review

I didn’t know anything about DJ Frankie Wilde before I saw this movie and I’m not sure I know much more now. It’s All Gone Pete Tong! isn’t so much a bio-pic as a feel good riff. Starring a dynamic Paul Kaye the film vacillates unevenly between comedy and pathos which is unfortunate because ultimately the parts of the film that should be most moving work well while the comedy falls flat- the laughs just aren’t as interesting as the rest of what’s going on.

Kaye is best known as an English TV comedian but proves himself an able actor here. The Wilde of the film is a DJ working in the Mediterranean and rising up to rule the club scene, a doofus party animal who despite his considerable gifts for mixing and presenting dance music falls victim to the same boring excesses that derail most rock stars. He has an ill advised marriage to a beautiful but vacuous model, a growing drug habit and a well intentioned manager that is nonetheless a manager- not a friend- to the person who has made him rich.

But before these problems can flower into full-blown catastrophes something even worse happens. Wilde loses his hearing- all of it. The film does a great job of showcasing Wilde’s growing frustration and fear dropping us directly into his shoes by silencing and or muffling the soundtrack to the world that Wilde is trapped in. This effect works remarkably well and as Wilde’s world grows quieter and quieter his desperation grows louder and louder. Of course ultimately Frankie is trapped in himself and that’s a message the movie could have leaned on harder. Not only is it a great theme but it’s supported by the film’s fascination with finding the rhythm of life in general. Wilde gets his groove back for mixing and living in a moderately surprising way and finds himself back on top of the dance scene but I won’t reveal how it happens or what happens next.

There are some reasonably funny mockumentary moments where a bespectacled record label executive muses that they had to let Frankie go because, with one notable example, the field of music has been dominated by people who could…uh…hear. If you know the DJ scene you’ll recognize several familiar faces giving faux interviews about Wilde and as you can expect the soundtrack to the film is killer.

But my feelings about It’s All Gone Pete Tong are best summed up in a quiet moment when a completely deaf Frankie lifts his finger to his lips saying, “Hush,” in a soothing tone to his frantically excited manager who can’t stop blathering about how rich they are all going to be. It’s a moment of wonder, and peace unsullied by everything else that had gone wrong for Frankie Wilde right up to that point and also made the point that sometimes the thing we need to hear the most is what’s drowned out by everything else that pretends to be so important. It’s a moment for Frankie’s manager, not for Frankie.