Human Traffic is a weekend in the life of a group of Cardiff-based clubbers. The film follows the group as they prepare for a drug-fuelled Friday night out clubbing, which goes on long into Saturday morning and then the comedown of the rest of the weekend and gives us an insight into the “chemical generation” of the late 1990s.
The central character in this independent, British-made film is Jip, played by the excellent John Simm. Jip works during the week in a clothing store. He hates his job and lives for the weekends, counting down the days until he is free to meet his friends once again and hit the clubs. Jip’s best friend is Koop (Shaun Parkes), a budding DJ who works in a specialist record shop and has the gift of the gab when it comes to selling music to impressionable teenagers. Nina (Nicola Reynolds) is Koop’s girlfriend. She works in the fast food cafe of a cinema, after failing her interview to do Philosophy at college. Nina hates her job, not least her lecherous boss. Lulu (Lorraine Pilkington) is at college and has just come out of yet another bad relationship. Jip gets on better with Lulu than any other girl he’s ever known, and puts this down to the fact that they don’t fancy each other. But it appears that this is changing, and unbeknownst to each other, both are developing feelings. Finally, there is Moff (Danny Dyer). Moff is unemployed, lives with his parents and makes his living by dealing drugs to his friends. Moff is the archetypal bullsh*tter and can talk his way into or out of just about every situation.
And so, the five friends begin their night out together, accompanied by Nina’s seventeen year-old brother, Lee, who is planning to take drugs for the first
time that night. Nina’s view is that he is going to do it anyway, and she would rather he was with her than with his friends and the group are happy for him to join them. The evening gets off to a slightly ropey start when Moff realises that the extra ticket he had for the night club, promised to Lulu, who otherwise would not have been joining them that night, has disappeared. Jip takes matters into his own hands and manages to blag his way into the club on the pretext of interviewing the manager (played by DJ Carl Cox) for Mixmag magazine. Then the evening is back on track and the group can get on with enjoying themselves.
The main body of the film follows the events of that one night, from the girls getting ready for the night out right through to the club and beyond, when they go on to a party that lasts until the early hours. At times, I struggled to identify the perspective of the film. I was not sure whether it was taking an ironic look at club culture (some of the conversations and situations that the characters take completely seriously are so absurd that I am sure there must be a hint of irony in there. However, at times I felt that I was supposed to think that the characters were “really cool” and people to admire. I guess it can be taken either way, and it depends on your own perspective. If I was a serious clubber myself then perhaps I would simply enjoy the film for portraying a great night out. As I am not, I enjoyed it more from an ironic perspective than anything else. I am sure that serious clubbers would also see the humour in certain situations, particularly on the morning after the night before as the characters struggle to make polite conversation with their relatives over Sunday lunch.
The movie also explores the relationships and insecurities of the characters. Many of them have issues: Jip is suffering from sexual paranoia after an abortive attempt at sex with a girl he met on a previous night out; Koop can’t stand other men looking at Nina and his jealousy is threatening to ruin their relationship; Moff has nagging doubts (made worse by his father) that he is wasting his life – and of course there is the newly realised sexual tension between Jip and Lulu.
We are given further insights into the characters’ lives by brief moments of fantasy (as an example, Nina’s lecherous boss literally slobbering over her as he makes innuendo-filled comments to her at work, and Jip receiving a literal “corporate shafting” from a manager at work). Also we are party to their innermost thoughts as they think out loud in certain situations. I never used to like this sort of thing in films, but recently as I have become more open minded to the use of creative direction, I find that – when used sparingly and correctly – this kind of sequence can be quite funny and clever.
The film is well cast and it does help that the majority of the actors (with the exception of John Simm) have not been seen in huge numbers of other films or TV shows, making them more believable as anonymous clubbers just like thousands of other young people on a Friday night out. Danny Dyer was my personal favourite, simply for the super-confident, cocky manner that he portrays perfectly, whilst still letting us see the occasional insecure side of Moff. There are also a couple of notable cameos in addition to the aforementioned Carl Cox: Andrew Lincoln (This Life, Teachers) puts in an appearance as Felix, another clubber on the periphery of the group, who shares a particularly funny meeting with Jip in the pub, and Jo Brand as the voice of Reality.
The film inevitably brings to mind other British movies in the same vein, most notably Trainspotting, for its heavy drug references, but this is on the whole a much less dark, much more upbeat film with some very funny moments. The frequent drug taking, and the fact that it seems wholly acceptable amongst the characters in the film, will probably offend some people and the film is certainly not for everyone. In fact, in a scene where Lulu and Nina find themselves interviewed by a news reporter making a documentary on club culture, there is a subtle jibe at people who say that such films encourage drug taking (Lulu and Nina say they have given up taking Ecstasy since they saw Trainspotting, as that made them want to take Heroin instead). Indeed, the drugs are not portrayed in a negative light at all, although we do get to see a little of the paranoia and comedown experienced by the group the following day.
Unsurprisingly, the movie has a great soundtrack (Pete Tong is credited as Music Supervisor) which will particularly appeal if you were into the club scene of the late ‘90s.
I wanted to really like this film, as my overwhelming impression was that it was an ironic look at club culture in the late 1990s, which – as someone who has never been more than an occasional clubber, but probably did most of my clubbing around this time period – appealed to me and did make me laugh in many places. However, I had a nagging feeling all the way through that I was somehow missing the point and perhaps I should have been admiring the characters for how cool they were, rather than laughing at the insularity of their existence. As I have been writing this review I hace come to the conclusion that perhaps it is designed to appeal to both types of audience – and if so, I think it has done a fairly good job and is cleverer than I originally gave it credit for. Although I would lean more towards the ironic perspective, I am sure that big names in the clubbing world like Carl Cox and Pete Tong would not have associated themselves with it had they felt it was too much of a mickey take. If you have never been a heavy clubber, you will laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. If you have, then no doubt some of the situations will strike a chord and raise a smile.
The DVD is currently available on Amazon at £5.97 so is certainly not going to break the bank. It is – unsurprisingly - an 18 certificate due to the huge amounts of drug taking portrayed in the film.
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![Human Traffic [1999] [DVD]](http://picnica.ciao.com/uk/78550962.jpg "Human Traffic [1999] [DVD]")
Jun 7th, 2004
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