{"id":678878,"date":"2026-09-08T17:17:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T17:17:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/678878\/"},"modified":"2026-09-08T17:17:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T17:17:11","slug":"oasis-dont-look-back-in-anger-tears-tantrums-and-gallagher-kids-getting-spangled-every-night-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/678878\/","title":{"rendered":"Oasis: Don\u2019t Look Back in Anger \u2013 Tears, tantrums and Gallagher kids getting spangled every night \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oasis: Don\u2019t Look Back in Anger<\/strong> <\/p>\n

\ue9d9 \ue9d9 \ue9d9 \ue9d9 \ue9d7<\/strong> <\/p>\n

Director:<\/strong> Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace<\/p>\n

Cert:<\/strong> 15A<\/p>\n

Starring:<\/strong> Liam Gallagher, Noel Gallagher, Paul \u201cBonehead\u201d Arthurs, Gem Archer, Andy Bell<\/p>\n

Running Time:<\/strong> 2 hrs 3 mins<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t mention the war. Seventeen years ago, on August 28th, 2009, Noel<\/a> and Liam<\/a> Gallagher had a \u201cfrank and firm exchange of views\u201d backstage at the Rock en Seine festival, on the outskirts of Paris<\/a>, leading to the immediate, sensational break-up of Oasis<\/a> after 18 years together as a band.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s with some sadness and great relief to tell you that I quit Oasis tonight,\u201d Noel posted online a few hours later. \u201cPeople will write and say what they like, but I simply could not go on working with Liam a day longer.\u201d<\/p>\n

The brothers\u2019 falling-out and unexpected return for their reunion tour of 2025, which included a sold-out (and, controversially<\/a>, dynamically priced) gig at Croke Park<\/a> in Dublin, is the starting point for this noisy rockumentary.<\/p>\n

Archive footage recalls the implosion before we enter the rehearsal room for six weeks of preparation for Oasis\u2019s 41-show Live \u201925 tour. But we never do get the lowdown on the big strop. <\/p>\n

What actually happened? According to what Noel told the media in 2011, the Gallaghers had been rowing because Liam wanted to promote his clothing range in the band\u2019s tour programmes. <\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t think it was right for him to be flogging his gear to our fans,\u201d the older brother said, proposing that Liam pay full rate for the adverts. \u201cHe couldn\u2019t get his head around that. He hit the roof. Things really went downhill from there.\u201d<\/p>\n

It all culminated, according to Noel, with Liam throwing a plum at him in the dressingroom that night in France, then trying to hit him with a guitar. \u201cHe nearly took my face off with it,\u201d the older brother said in the 2015 interview. \u201cIt was a really unnecessary, violent act.\u201d<\/p>\n

That account doesn\u2019t materialise in the film. Instead, Noel and Liam appear together as an older, guarded and PR-wiser Oasis, still swearing and boasting about how their kids \u2013 who were kept apart by the famous feud \u2013 get \u201cspangled\u201d together every night. <\/p>\n

The earlier band were a product of the hedonistic dance-rock mash-up that was Madchester, with wild psychedelic retreads such as Happy Mondays and Inspiral Carpets.<\/p>\n

But Noel, a sometime roadie for the Carpets, had ambitions beyond the cultish Ha\u00e7ienda hootenanny. Right from Supersonic, Oasis\u2019s first single, it was clear we were heading for stadiums to repeat the shuddering antics of classic rock acts such as The Rolling Stones and the popular Oasis soundalikes The Beatles.<\/p>\n

Later records borrowed from 1960s flower power, stomping 1970s glam and, featured on the cover of their first LP, Burt Bacharach.<\/p>\n

They proved, at the world\u2019s raviest moment, that rock could still sell. Along the way they contributed to the odd collective meltdown that was Britpop.<\/p>\n

At the height of it all, Liam and Patsy Kensit, his then wife, appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair magazine, lying on a Union Jack-themed bed above the headline \u201cLondon Swings Again!\u201d (Carnaby Street is a bit of a hike from any Manchester housing estate, but never mind.)<\/p>\n

It was a retro moment, just as the 2025 concerts were, yet it also satisfied a newly emerging swagger in the United Kingdom. This was working-class culture writ large and proud.<\/p>\n

It was also a moment for the Irish. Noel sees himself as an Irishman who just happens to have been born in Manchester.<\/p>\n

George Cragg\u2019s editing is the star as the film swerves between peak-1990s clips, rousing choruses and big cities. The concerts themselves are thunderous, and the crowd bawl, booze and belt out every song. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s more of a football crowd,\u201d says the police officer co-ordinating security before the tour\u2019s opening concert, in Cardiff<\/a>. He\u2019s right, but only in the impossible instance whereby both teams win. The visible outpouring of joy moves Noel to tears more than once.<\/p>\n

Oldies are present and correct. But the huge Gen Z contingent is more surprising. (The documentary\u2019s premiere at Venice film festival brought in a swarm of teenagers hoping to get their vinyls signed on the red carpet.) <\/p>\n

The film\u2019s inconsistent use of fan testimony often feels like an attempt to manufacture profundity. There\u2019s a lovely moment with an Ulster mum and her non-verbal son listening to Talk Tonight. Elsewhere, the personal stories are often slight.<\/p>\n

There are few outrageous, swaggering claims, save for a hypothesis that the world \u201cwent to shit\u201d after Oasis split up. Perhaps that is the film\u2019s strongest argument: Oasis offer escape, communal release and a version of belonging that feels vanishingly rare.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Mother from Mayo, father from Meath: How Irish are Oasis?Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Yes, they know how much you paid for your ticket. When Liam calls out to the \u201ccheap seats\u201d, he follows up with, \u201cOh, wait: there are no cheap seats. Sorry about that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rendition of The Auld Triangle by 80,000 Irish fans at Croke Park is special. But for all its noise, the film could do with more of what we most want to see: the Gallaghers being Gallaghers.<\/p>\n

In cinemas from Wednesday, September 9th<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oasis: Don\u2019t Look Back in Anger \ue9d9 \ue9d9 \ue9d9 \ue9d9 \ue9d7 Director: Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace Cert:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":678879,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[75],"tags":[1007,1887,18,117,19,17,1006,1005,1004,11492],"class_list":["post-678878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-croke-park","tag-disney","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-liam-gallagher","tag-noel-gallagher","tag-oasis","tag-venice-film-festival"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678878\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/678879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}