DVD Release Year: 1999
Director: Allan Moyle
Writers: Allan Moyle
Starring: Christian Slater, Samantha Mathis, Anthony Lucero, Scott Paulin, Mimi Kennedy, Cheryl Pollak, Robert Shenkkan, Seth Green, Holly Sampson
Length: 102 minutes
Studio: New Line Home Video
MPAA Rating:
Steal the air. Talk hard. Keep the dream alive.
Through the invisible night time airwaves of Arizona, Mark Hunter (Christian Slater) allows his alter-ego pirate DJ Happy Harry Hardon to speak out on such items as girls, music, and the pressures of society on teenagers he cannot bring himself to speak out on during the day due to a severe infliction of shyness. Slowly his fan base builds up, and piques the interest of Nora Diniro (Samantha Mathis) who sets out to unmask Happy Harry Hardon’s real identity.
However, not everyone is a fan of the pirate DJ. Through access to school records he slowly uncovers corruption at the high school he himself attends, and by doing so antagonizes the guidance counselor David Deaver (Robert Shenkkan) and Principal Loretta Cresswood (Annie Ross) into action against his fellow students. Further notoriety and criticism befalls him when fellow student Malcolm Kaiser (Anthony Lucero) commits suicide after calling into the radio show.
By speaking forth words that incite the establishment into interdiction, inspire his generation into united action, and may bring him the girl of his dreams, Happy Harry Hardon has everything to gain… but Mark Hunter has everything to lose.
Pump Up The Volume is a classic story that validates teen angst in a way never before shown, and never since having been repeated. While the movie suffers from a low production budget that included obvious gaffs (a teacher pushing the play button on a radio to stop a cassette, and pushing the pause button to play it; audio/visual not on sync towards the end), some hokey acting by under talented adults, and a lack of stunning visuals… the theme of anonymous voices “crying out in the wilderness” with a message is even more relevant today with the evolution of the internet blog as it was then.
Popcorn’s Rating:
- To be like Happy Harry Hardon you need to be both happy and hard. The CANDY CIGARETTES
should be able to make you happy and make people think your hardcore without exposing yourself to the possibilities of lung cancer.Popularity: 28% [?]
