Beats (2019 British film)

Beats
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Brian Welsh
Screenplay by	Kieran Hurley Brian Welsh
Based on	Beats by Kieran Hurley
Produced by	Camilla Bray
Starring	Laura Fraser Lorn Macdonald Cristian Ortega
Cinematography	Benjamin Kračun
Edited by	Robin Hill
Music by	Stephen Hindman Penelope Trappes
Production company	British Film Institute
Distributed by	Altitude Film Distribution
Release dates	24 January 2019 (2019-01-24) (IFFR) 17 May 2019 (2019-05-17) (United Kingdom) 26 June 2020 (2020-06-26) (United States)
Running time	96 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Budget	> £25,000[1]
Box office	$325,493[2]

Beats is a 2019 British drama film directed by Brian Welsh.^[3][4] It was based upon a play of the same name by Kieran Hurley, who adapted the screenplay with Welsh; Steven Soderbergh acts as an executive producer. The plot follows a pair of teenage friends in 1994 Scotland who try and sneak into an illegal rave party. The film was released in the United Kingdom on 17 May 2019.

Premise

The film is set in 1994 in Livingston, Scotland, against the backdrop of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, which effectively banned outdoor rave parties across the whole of the UK. Best friends Johnno and Spanner are going to a rave for the first, and perhaps last time together.

Production

Brian Welsh first came into contact with Steven Soderbergh around 2015, after Soderbergh had seen an episode of Black Mirror that Welsh had directed and approached him with a new project. While Welsh turned that down, he showed his Beats script to Soderbergh, who then signed on as an executive producer on the film.^[5] For the climactic rave sequence, filming took place in a warehouse in the Glasgow city centre, using over 1,500 background actors.^[1] The film's soundtrack was curated by JD Twitch of Optimo.^[6]

Release

Beats had its international debut at the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam.^[7] On 17 May 2019 it was released in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, and on 7 November 2019 in the Netherlands.^[8]

Reception

On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 98% based on 62 reviews, with an average of 7.7/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "Well-acted and enlivened by an evocative soundtrack and period detail, Beats draws timeless themes out of its specific story and setting."^[9] At Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 74 out of 100, based on 14 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".^[10]

Wendy Ide of The Guardian gave the film 4/5 stars, writing: "It's a terrific little film that combines the earthy humour and honesty of a Shane Meadows movie with an unexpected expressionistic section – flooded with colour – that channels the boys' joyful dancefloor abandon."^[11] In a separate Guardian review, Mike McCahill gave it three stars, saying that "this teen bromance eventually escapes into amiable nostalgia and artful euphoria".^[12]

References

1. "How filmmakers created the riotous 1,500-strong warehouse rave in Beats". The Independent. 17 May 2019. Retrieved 11 November 2019.
2. "Beats (2019)". The Numbers. Retrieved 10 September 2020.
3. "Beats 2019, directed by Brian Welsh". Time Out London. Retrieved 11 November 2019.
4. "Meet the stars of 90s-set Scottish rave movie Beats - The Skinny". www.theskinny.co.uk. Retrieved 11 November 2019.
5. Alistair Harkness (20 May 2019). "Brian Welsh interview: The Beats director on how Steven Soderbergh helped make his Scottish-set rave film a reality". The Scotsman. Retrieved 25 June 2020.
6. Mickles, Kiana (15 August 2019). "JD Twitch-curated soundtrack for '90s Scottish rave film Beats to get vinyl release · News ⟋ RA". Resident Advisor. Retrieved 22 March 2021.
7. "Beats". IFFR (in Dutch). 5 January 2019. Retrieved 27 April 2020.
8. "Beats @ September Film". septemberfilm.nl (in Dutch). Archived from the original on 9 April 2018. Retrieved 27 April 2020.
9. "Beats (2019)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango. Retrieved 10 October 2021.
10. "Beats Reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved 6 July 2020.
11. Ide, Wendy (19 May 2019). "Beats review – raving against the dying of the light". The Observer. ISSN 0029-7712. Retrieved 11 November 2019 – via www.theguardian.com.
12. McCahill, Mike (16 May 2019). "Beats review – blissed-out flashbacks to the 90s rave scene". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 11 November 2019 – via www.theguardian.com.

External links

• Beats at IMDb