X-MEN actor James McAvoy turns director in this charming, fast-paced, you-cannot-believe-it's-true story of two young Scottish lads who adopt Eminem-adjacent American personas to fool the prejudiced London music industry into giving them a recording contract. Unable to attract interest as "the rapping Proclaimers", Billy and Gavin get a recording contract as their California avatars Silibil and Brains, and predictably proceed to exploit their new-found access to booze and girls. They want to reveal their true identities on a famous MTV show live on air, and show up the music industry as bigots, because will they have the courage to go through with it? And if they don't, what will lying to their colleagues, friends, family and even to themselves to do their psyches?
The arc of this film is pretty unexciting and predictable. Decent kids get fame, go crazy, fall out with each other, turn their backs on all that is wholesome and true, before a last-act redemption. What makes the film worth watching are the kinetic, grab-you-by-the-balls direction; the compelling central performances from Samuel Bottomley and Sean Maclean Ross, who have to rap as well as act; and the sheer insanity of the story. After I watched this film, I went on to watch the documentary, "The Great Hip Hop Hoax", and to read the real-life Gavin's autobiography. If anything, this feature film re-telling underplays just how good the boys were musically, just how far they got in the music industry, and just what utter nightmares they were when they started exploiting alcohol and women.
A special shout out to actress Lucy Halliday (currently starring in The Testaments), who forms the calm moral centre of the film. There's something really transfixing about her stoicism and quiet, understated performance. Where another actress or another director might have asked her for histrionics, Halliday just radiates good sense, disenchantment and a quiet fierce strength as Billy's girlfriend Mary.
CALIFORNIA SCHEMIN' has a running time of 107 minutes. It played Toronto 2025 and is currently on release in the UK.
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