“Do you ever the feeling that everything in America is completely fucked up?” – Pump up the Volume (1990)

‘Pump Up the Volume’ is a 1990 comedy drama film directed by Allan Moyle. This film in incorporates the medium of radio as a quiet teenager, Mark, runs a pirate radio station which causes and uproar and rebellion in teens. Mark is an outsider who uses a pirate radio station to express his teen angst and aggression under the ego of ‘Hard Harry’.

The use of anonymity in expression teenager’s thoughts and feelings has always been around and is now used mainly on the internet. The internet has increased the ease for people to distribute anonymous messages. In the film we see the use of anonymity to create rebellion amongst school students and this ego of ‘Hard Harry’  address some of the issues of adolescence. At the end of the film he is ultimately arrested, as they track down the radio signals.  These days it is much easier to remain anonymous, however there has also been an increase in the technology use to track down certain people’s ip address etc.