Pet Shop Boys: Performance (1991)
British pop duo Pet Shop Boys captured on film 1-3 June 1991 at Birmingham NEC on their Performance tour. This film, by Eric Watson, features the live show and footage filmed backstage. Digitally remastered and visually restored in 2004. Setlist: 01. This Must Be The Place I've Waited Years To Leave; 02. It's A Sin; 03. Losing My Mind; 04. What Have I Done To Deserve This?; 05. My October Symphony; 06. I'm Not Scared; 07. We All Feel Better In The Dark; 08. So Sorry, I Said ; 09. Suburbia; 10. So Hard; 11. Opportunities (Let's Make Lots Of Money); 12. How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously?; 13. Rent; 14. Where The Streets Have No Name (I Can't Take My Eyes Off You); 15. West End Girls; 16. Jealousy; 17. Always On My Mind; 18. Your Funny Uncle
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Let's be realistic.
A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.
It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,
Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.
An outstanding artistic piece encompassing the musical brilliance of the Pet Shop Boys, wonderfully choreographed dance and artistic theater. The live show was captured over 3 nights of the Birmingham section to their 1991 tour. Outstanding performances by Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe (including a brief strip by Chris). Katie Puckrik stands out as amongst dancers with wonderfully realistic poses and character animation. Pam Sheyne takes my top spot amongst the backing singers. I rarely give perfect scores, few things cannot be improved but this left me wanting to raise the rating system above 10. A thoroughly entertaining watch and a must have for any fan of the PSB.
A live gig disguised as a theatre performance, this was a very bold experiment that turned out to be a huge success. The Pet Shop Boys have always been very keen to experiment visually, proving that pop music, if handled correctly, can also become a work of art.Using a string of their songs, they created a storyline, vaguely beginning from school years and ending in paradise. They worked with opera designers D.Alden & D.Fielding and a group of classically trained dancers. The choreography (by J.Marley) is just staggering. The dancers roam around the stage endlessly constantly changing costumes (from schoolboy uniforms to pigs and demons) and the atmosphere created is unique in every single song played (eg. from teenage guilt in "This must be the place..", to melancholy in "My October Symphony", to pure joy in "You were always on my mind").The whole performance is very theatrical, and the Boys get to do a lot of acting and dancing at times. They choose to ignore the audience (at least until the closing song) and there are no musicians on stage (just guitarist J.J. Belle and keyboardist Scott Davidson playing out of view). The end result is fascinating, and easily watchable even from people who are not familiar with the duo's music.