Director: Simon Emmett
Career-spanning documentary, with unavoidable Spinal Tap overtones.
Marking 20 years since The Darkness enjoyed their brief but explosive commercial peak as million-selling, chart-topping, glamrocking panto-metal sensations, Simon Emmett’s career-spanning documentary plots a familiar soap-opera arc of riffs and rifts, break-ups and breakdowns, huge hits and fragile egos, arena-filling stardom and pitifully small reunion tours. Along the way there’s a two-year estrangement between singer Justin Hawkins and his guitarist brother Dan, a spell in rehab, a scary brush with testicular cancer, and a gloriously naff parade of eye-watering outfits.
Crucially, The Darkness had songwriting skills, charisma and wit that elevated them far above most short-lived novelty pop acts. Justin remains a gold-plated English eccentric in the classic mode, half Jarvis Cocker and half Kenneth Williams, a natural livewire entertainer on stage and off. The singer is Emmett’s secret weapon, still funny on camera, as much stand-up comedian as preposterously preening peacock rocker. “People used to
