Clarke's "STARS OF THE ROLLER STATE DISCO" (1984)

[paulino]

i'm looking for that Alan Clarke film, i didn't know it existed since it's not even listed on imdb, but it does..

"Play, written by Michael Hastings, about a group of unemployed teenagers who try to gain fame as roller-skaters."

[WJ Cluckinfold]

I've been searching for a copy of this for some years now. It was originally broadcast on December 4, 1984 as part of the BBC1 series "Play for Today". I've all but lost any hope of ever finding a copy, I did find this review, however... "Stars of the Roller State Disco - w Michael Hastings. Odd, well-remembered but perhaps not brilliant near-future dystopian satire, positing a grim future where permanently unemployed youths are forcibly inducted into the graffiti-covered titular disco to learn basic skills from endless instructional videos in the increasingly folorn hope of gaining employment, skating gormlessly round and round in the meantime. Perry Benson plays Carly, a Chippendale-obsessed apprentice carpenter proudly rejecting offers of work he considers beneath him ('I'm a craftsman!') to the consternation of girlfriend Cathy Murphy. Shot on good old videotape in three days by Alan Clarke, on a cavernous set part-designed by writer Hastings, the on-the-nose nature of the play's overarching conceit is offset to an extent by its many quirks, notably the casting of the gawky, speccy Benson as something approaching a romantic hero."

[umma-ohz]

This sounds weird as hell!

...and very hard to find at the same time.

[neilmac]

I have recently acquired Clarke's "Stars of the Roller State Disco", if interested then PM me.