Who Killed the KLF?

To be honest, I was just looking for something relaxing to put on in the background to help me fall asleep. Scrolling around, half-zoned out, and then - bam - I saw the title.

I stopped in my tracks.

"KLF? THE KLF? Aha aha?!"

I've loved and listened to their music since I was a young little tot - through my teens, my twenties, my thirties, and I'm still blasting KLF in my fourties.

So, obviously, I decided sleep ain't happening. *This* was happening. I grabbed some food, charged my vape, got super comfy... Ready for a late-night nostalgic rabbit hole.

Man... how anticlimactic that turned out to be.

What follows is a documentary that somehow manages to take one of the most unpredictable, flamboyant, anti-establishment acts in music history... and make them boring, confusing, and emotionally hollow.

The main culprit is the editing. It's aggressively stylized, non-linear, and obsessed with recreating the chaos of the KLF's image - but it completely fails at basic storytelling. There's no rhythm, no build, no emotional arc. Just a blender of VHS clips, cryptic voiceovers, reenactments, and half-explained moments that go absolutely nowhere.

Here's one of the worst examples: Claire Fletcher, who joined the KLF on a weird ritualistic trip to Jura, suddenly says: "Now I have four children. Kitty Lily Fletcher. It was meant to be, clearly. She hates that story."

What? Who? Why?

Only after pausing to search online did I find out she met her husband on that trip, and they later named their daughter Kitty Lily Fletcher, a tribute to KLF (the initials). That's a genuinely sweet and poetic real-life detail. In the film, it's edited like a riddle on shuffle play.

Same goes for the love story: she mentions reaching out to a guy and suddenly they're married with kids. No setup, no emotional payoff - just a bizarre cut to "happily ever after."

And then there's the completely false claim that "you can't find KLF's music anywhere today." As I said, I've been enjoying their music for literal decades, from CDs to MP3s to streaming, I can confidently say: that's simply not true.

Their music is on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube, Bandcamp - it's everywhere. It's a simple google search. So either the filmmakers didn't bother to update that section, or they chose to preserve the myth at the cost of the truth.

I get the intent: reflect the mystery and anti-commercial chaos of the KLF. But that doesn't excuse turning a fascinating story into a disjointed, self-indulgent collage that constantly alienates the viewer. You can be surreal and make sense. You can honor a band's weirdness without confusing the hell out of your audience.

Instead, we get a documentary that refuses to explain itself, even when it desperately needs to.

There's value in the subject matter - the KLF really were one of the most interesting acts of the 20th century. But this film buries that story under cryptic editing and false mystique.

Unless you're a hardcore fan who already knows all the context, don't expect insight. Just expect vibes.

I dont get it. I was there at the time and I think the KLF only meant something to the indie music press because at the time the indie music press just didnt get the rave scene. They could latch onto the KLF, but on the acid house/rave scene KLF were a bit of a joke. We all remember them as the wacky guys that burnt a million quid, well thats a bit embarrassing now isnt it? This documentary is just hyped up nonsense. A sort of 80's/90's Spinal Tap, but not funny.

I don't believe a word of the 'put together from previously unheard tapes' claims and am hugely suspicious of the provenance of this film, some of the participants claims, and some of the footage. It feels like an attempt to retrofit legendary status to a band and art movement that never really fortified its message, I suspect by the band themselves...but perhaps that's the point.

Having spent four years at art school in the eighties and danced through the nineties in my twenties I don't recall The KLF as much more than a curious novelty act who also happened to have a couple of decent tunes, and certainly not 'the hottest band on the planet with the music world in their hands' as this film claims. The horns, the wheelchairs the money burning etc always seemed an eye-rolling-inducing cry for attention to me, but like all art, good or bad, that's a bit subjective I suppose. I certainly don't remember them being the legends that this film claims them to be, but perhaps that's the point too.

The world definitely needed the KLF and their kind of pop-situationist nihilism should always have a place in the world but they were definitely of their time and this film is too meta to draw any reassuring, or even insightful, conclusions. Perhaps that's the point too.

So I can't help feeling cheated and slightly insulted by this film. They were good, but they weren't THAT good; after all these years, and in a more self-referential and cynical world, I think it would have been more interesting to get something a little more witty and perceptive from Drummond and Cauty rather than an exercise in trying (and failing IMO) to galvanise the myth, and the 'legend', especially when they seem to be saying ultimately, through a haze of regret (whether real or unreal), that their modus operandi was without purpose or any real meaning. The idea of sowing chaos, for instance, is a lot more interesting when viewed though the prism of today's world, but this is never explored.

A missed opportunity, but maybe that was the whole point. Either way, I hope the re-released back catalogue gives them a bit of a pension; just try not to 'burn it' this time.

Well can I just say that to the people who are complaining about the documentary not being good enough and not what they expected from the klf well to be fair they didn't want this documentary aired at all and started legal proceedings against the producers who actually made this documentary which I believe had something to with James corden's production company so yes there was alot of things in it that maybe didn't make much sense and wasn't what alot of people expected from this pair of guys who were behind it but as I said before it wasn't them who actually wanted it aired and would almost certainly have done it differently so maybe take that into account.

Is this movie worth watching? No.

How was the plot? Boring.

Was the budget enough? Yes.

What is this movie saying about our world? Stop techno.

What is your emotional response to this movie? Yawn.

What did this movie make me feel? Bored.

What moments, character, or ideas resonated with me while watching this movie? The end.

What thoughts does this movie spark in me? Run.

What themes are present in this movie? Greed.

Why would someone want to watch this film? Because they didn't change the channel fast enough.

What is one good or cool thing I could say about this movie to someone else? It is in engineering.

What does this movie have to say about the big story we are in? Stop watching movies.

What does it make me think about? Going home.