Oasis: Don't Look Back In Anger (15)

On July 4, 2025, brothers Liam and Noel Gallagher began a series of high-profile live shows dubbed the Oasis Live '25 tour in Cardiff., more than 30 years after the release of the band's debut album, Definitely Maybe. Documentary film cameras capture one of the biggest musical events of 2025, combining rehearsal footage, backstage access and onstage performances with the first joint interviews of Noel and Liam in over 20 years.

LondonNet Film Review

Oasis: Don’t Look Back In Anger (15) Film Review from LondonNet

On July 4 2025, Liam and Noel Gallagher kicked off a 41-date world tour dubbed Oasis Live ’25 at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff. It was the first time the brothers had performed together since they split after an argument in the dressing room at the 2009 Rock en Seine festival near Paris. Mobile phone footage of an on-stage announcement (“The band doesn’t exist anymore…”) cues the only chorus of jeers and boos you’ll hear in Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace’s rhapsodic documentary…

The remaining two hours of Oasis: Don’t Look Back In Anger is an unabashed valentine to the rabble-rousing Manchester siblings and their bandmates, juxtaposing electrifying on-stage performances with crowd shots, backstage material and the first joint interview of Noel and Liam in over 20 years. The pair trade playful banter and casually drop c- and f-bombs into sentences with the same ease and frequency as commas and full stops.

Stationary cameras capture rehearsals. Liam is absent on day one. “Obviously I’ll have to sing,” quips Noel, and after a few minutes of blowing off cobwebs, guitarist Paul ‘Bonehead’ Arthurs observes that he’s been put “in the middle of a Gallagher sandwich” with Liam and Noel due to stand either side of him. On day two, Liam walks in, performs for the day and leaves without saying a word. Six weeks of rehearsals pay dividends, and after opening night in Cardiff, Noel confesses that he is taken aback “by the intensity of what it meant to people”.

The film’s set list includes venue-specific performances of Some Might Say (Manchester’s Heaton Park), Roll With It (Dublin’s Croke Park) and Wonderwall (Buenos Aires’ Estadio Mas Monumental). Liam dedicates Live Forever to the late Stone Roses and Primal Scream bassist Gary “Mani” Mounfield. Snapshots of fans gushing about the reunion (“It’s like the rebirth of Christ!”) add flecks of colour and humour. By contrast, a survivor of the 2017 Manchester Arena bombings hears “Don’t Look Back In Anger” live for the first time. The song became an anthem for a city in mourning and, too neatly, underlines the Gallaghers’ reunion after 15 years of embittered silence.

Any potential potholes in the road to reconciliation are swerved. There’s no mention of the furore surrounding ticketing for the tour and, curiously, the film doesn’t address why the brothers decided to heal old wounds. “I was born with one fatal flaw in my character. I will not forgive people,” explains Noel in archive footage. By the end of these two hours, he’s changed his tune, sharing public displays of affection with Liam on stage as Jackie DeShannon trills What The World Needs Now Is Love. Fans will certainly love Southern and Lovelace’s film; the rest of us can just roll with it.

– Kim Hu