Withnail and I: 20 Years On

To mark the 20th anniversary of the ultimate student film, a digitally re-mastered 'Withnail and I' is released on a three-disc 20th Anniversary Edition. Including a brand new interview with writer Bruce Robinson, a 'Postcards From Penrith' featurette and the 1999 documentary 'Withnail and Us', the package also includes a guide to the Drinking Game and, of course, the original soundtrack.

Known for its unparalleled quote-ability, 'Withnail and I's humour has been re-worked time and again; bizarre characters with indecipherable anecdotes were later recalled in 'Wayne's World' and The Fast Show, among others. And yet the film was very much of its time. That this eulogy to the 1960s was produced amid the artistic pessimism of the Thatcher years lends an added poignancy to the bittersweet tale of two unemployed actors who go on holiday "by mistake" as the decade of free love and revolution is drawing to a close.

Although perhaps resonating most strongly with those whose lives swing between Hamlet and hangovers, 'Withnail and I' exists as much more than a student rite of passage: it has proved itself a classic. The film fits with a description of the country rock movement of the late sixties, "Not only the music of the jaded and the whisky-soaked; it spoke of the disillusioning experiences of youth." Twenty years on, the success of 'Withnail and I' has proved that beneath the quintessentially English humour, there is something universal at work. [Caroline Hurley]