I was a Britpop tragic. By the time they first played New Zealand in early 1998, the freebie red Oasis shirt I'd got just months earlier with the band's grand folly Be Here Now was already a faded pink.
Half the crowd turned up in the same shirt, though it was clear few had been worn in public as often as mine. Never the coolest band on this side of the world, Oasis' stock had plummeted since the release of Be Here Now, which according to the band's officially sanctioned biography, doesn't even exist.
Nothing that happened after 1996's Knebworth mega-concerts rates a mention in Supersonic, which is a bit like ending The Beatles Anthology after the Shea Stadium gig.
The film runs through the band's early days with efficiency and pastiche, much like how Noel penned the band's first - and inarguably best - two albums. Archival footage is mixed with animation and some of the thickest Mancunian accents to ever go to air without subtitles.
With Oasis' rise to superstardom part of the rock canon, Supersonic shines when it looks behind the scenes - Noel's giddy optimism after writing 'Live Forever', how close their debut album came to being a turd, what drugs turned their LA gig in 1994 into such a disaster.
Little new is added to the main storyline, however, and much of the running time is wasted on the Gallagher brothers' rivalry. It would've been better spent teaching us stuff we don't already know.
There's gold in there - the highlight being Noel's bit about how he's a cat and Liam's a dog - but 20 years on, quite frankly, I'm more interested in the music.
The movie's more than half-done before we hear anything from (What's the Story) Morning Glory?, and it completely ignores the band's bitter public rivalry with Blur and love affair with future warmonger Tony Blair.
And after two hours, it's all over. The only hint Oasis didn't call it quits after Knebworth is found right back at the start of the film - it's about 1992, they're yet to make it out of the rehearsal room, but what's that tune Liam's singing? 'All Around the World', from the record whose name dare not be spoken.
Supersonic is a strangely truncated film, which starts out so well and ends with the viewer wondering - to borrow a phrase from Standing on the Shoulder of Giants - where did it all go wrong?
Two-and-a-half stars.
Oasis: Supersonic:: Director: Tate Taylor:: Starring: Noel Gallagher, Liam Gallagher:: Rating: R16 - Drug use and offensive language:: Running Time: 122 minutes:: Release Date: October 13, 2016
Newshub.
