Why you can trust 12DOVE Our experts review games, movies and tech over countless hours, so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about our reviews policy.
Inspired by cellmate Jack (Clemens, former lead saxophonist for Bruce Springsteen's E-Street Band), Martin (Speer) gets out of prison with the ambition of forming a swing band. Thus he recruits his ex, Joan (singer Stansfield) and a crew of Liverpool's flotsam (including Alexi Sayle) to play support.
The result is a rom-com that suffers from following too closely in the steps of The Commitments, which did the whole getting-a-band-together thing much better. Lisa Stansfield acquits herself well in the lead, but the jokes are weak, the attempts at social commentary hashed and the band improbably good from the minute they pick up their instruments.
That, combined with a contrived side plot involving the police and Nerys Hughes - - out of character as an Italian mamma - - leaves this Britflick with little audience appeal outside hardcore Stansfield fans.
