Guitarist Steve Jones plays a shady private detective who – through a series of set piece acts – uncovers the truth about the band. Drummer Paul Cook and bass guitaristSid Vicious play smaller roles, and the band's manager, Malcolm McLaren, is featured as "The Embezzler", the man who manipulates the Sex Pistols. Fugitive train robberRonnie Biggs, performer Edward Tudor-Pole, sex film starMary Millington, and actresses Irene Handl and Liz Fraser also make appearances. Singer and frontman Johnny Rotten refused to have anything to do with the film, stating that it was "a pile of rubbish" and "Malcolm's vision of what he believed – not true in any form". The movie tells a stylised fictional account of the formation, rise and subsequent break-up of the band, from the point of view of their then-manager McLaren. In the film, McLaren claims to have created the Sex Pistols, and manipulate them to the top of the music business, using them as puppets to both further his own agenda, and to claim the financial rewards from the various record labels the band were signed to during their brief existence – EMI, A&M, Virgin, and Warner Bros. Records.
In addition, the film also includes appearances by musician Dave Dee and reporter Alan Jones as themselves.
Background
The footage was filmed in early to mid-1978, between the departure of singer John Lydon from the band and their subsequent split. The movie was finally released nearly two years later. Lydon and original bass guitarist Glen Matlock only appear in archive footage — Lydon refused to have anything to do with the production. The film was shown at the wake of Joy Division frontman Ian Curtis after his 1980 suicide. The 2000 documentary The Filth and the Fury, also directed by Julien Temple, re-tells the story of the Sex Pistols from the perspective of the band, thus serving as a response to and rebuttal of McLaren's insistence that he was the driving creative force of the band.
"The Swindle Continues in Your Own Home" was the tagline on the original 18 certificate UK VHS release from Virgin Video in 1982. Warner/Reprise Video released the film on US home video in 1992. In 2005, the film was released on DVD by Shout Factory.
