Kneecap

Rich Peppiatt’s film has a hard time connecting its stylish music video silliness with drama that meanders and a political message that repeats like it’s stuck on a cheap turntable.

It crackles with energy, attitude and youth, and takes you along for a riotous and persuasive ride.

This highly original film is about liberation, of an indigenous language and of the people who speak it. As Caitlin puts it: “A country without a language is only half a nation.”

As befits the story at its core, the film it's a rockus, it's unruly, it's edearingly shambolic... In the great pantheon of pop biopics, I think this is one of the most distinctive offerings.

Rich Peppiatt, making his feature debut after directing one of the band’s videos, brings a manic, irreverent energy to the film, incorporating scrawled animation that looks like toilet-door graffiti brought to life. But the driving force is the band.

Hard-punching and cheerfully riotous, the film directs a well-placed kick at the nether regions to anyone who insists music, politics and cinema cannot mix.

This film might not be everyone’s cup of tea, and it's a bit hard to discern at times. Still, the creative and imaginative direction makes this one of the most original movies of the year.

[Kneecap] endears not only these characters but the plight of all Ireland against British oppression, which still prevalent today. The music is also fantastic.

Although there is serious subject matter in this movie, it is also very funny. It works as a stoner comedy, and also as a musical comedy with a powerful anti-establishment working class heart. This is like a Belfast version of "Straight Outta Compton."

...as exuberantly messy and defiantly anarchic as the music of the Irish rap band whose origin story it purports to tell ...