Overrated and overhyped

One of my all time favorites.

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

I've read up lots of background to this film .. John Birmingham, the novel, the stage play .. I guess the stage play must have been good, it ran for a long time in Aus. You can't really have a stage play with slow, dreary action and dialogue, but you sure can in a film.I've lived in share houses & flats in Aus and London and they were fun, with lots of great people and parties around at other people's flats, weekly tennis bookings, nights out at the pub (like The Lord Dudley in Sydney) etc. I can't recognise the dreary, hopeless, filthy dirty world portrayed here, but then I didn;t live in houses full of druggies either.This film drags from start to finish. Nothing believable happens. The lines are sloooow, with lingering shots of pained faces. There are a few comic moments, but they're deliberatley cut off to go back to the painful dragging. It's like a documentary of a series of squats lived in by unemployed drop-outs, shot in slow motion.Film have to be sharp and fast, with quick witty dialogue for me. Enough said.

Sitting 'round Pemberton doing nothing, flicking through the channels, and stopped purely because of one of my (many) favourite tunes was on...Golden Brown by the Stranglers...of course that's the opening sequence to this movie.....Didn't know a thing about it really but just watched it in amazement.I related to the main character quite a bit purely because I travel so much and don't really have any proper roots, and feel that real frustration when people you're living with get so wrapped up in their own little problems when your own seem, at the time, insurmountable.I refer to a particular scene when Danny just blows up at the whining wannabe soap star....I think sometimes I should do the same!! The film is a comedy, but be warned it also goes very dark at times.....one of the characters tries to commit suicide is one grim example.There's a bit of philosophy going on in there but you'd have to watch it a few times and probably read up a little to understand it....I didn't! Because Movie Central was repeating this over and over again I ended up watching it a second time and got to understand it a little more...oh and if Emily Hamilton is single and ever in London/Whistler BC then I'd wine and dine her, that girl is hot....and a bloody good actress as well!

A great Aussie film successfully continuing the tradition of character based humour that made shows such as the BBC's 'The Young Ones' so successful. The protagonist's frequent housing changes and philosophical musings are entertaining and while there isn't so much as an overall plot to tie it all together, you are absorbed by the gripping personalities of the characters. The film contains every sort of bizarre and twisted personality imaginable and flaunts them in a parade of pagan rituals, drug abuse, vaguely criminal activity and postmodern angst. However much of the humour relies on an understanding of Australian stereotypes and only viewers who are able to connect Queensland with cane toads and right wing military nut jobs, Melbourne with gangland crime and dodgy police, and Sydney with anal retentives, will appreciate the farcical situations that arise. Not nearly as gritty as 'Trainspotting' but if the bizarre lives and apathetic self discovery of that appealed to you then you'll probably appreciate 'He Died with a Felafel in His Hand' as well. Not for people who aren't prepared to accept subtlety in films.

I have read the previous comments and of course, a movie rarely comes close to the book, due to time constraints and of course it always has to fight one's fantasy. But that's OK, if the movie is well made and this one is ...And apart from that, I had shared house experiences in Brisbane for several years and everybody who had too can appreciate this movie, as it is so true ... and believe me, a lot of the subjects or experiences are quite close to the truth, as crazy as it may sound :-)The Queenslander reminds me so much of my first shared house. I started of living in a 2 by 2 meter room and soon moved into a bigger room. It was great fun!Watch it!