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The Wheel of Fortune. That's the metaphor of choice for the label boss at the heart of24 Hour Party People. The story, a semi-fictitious account of the Manchester music scene from the birth of punk to the death of acid house, revolves around Factory Records founder Tony Wilson, played by English comic Steve Coogan. Wilson's journey is one of ups and downs, or, shall we say, good and bad spins of the wheel.

If you're like me, you couldn't wait for this picture to come out. Manchester music -- Joy Division, New Order, The Smiths, The Stone Roses, Happy Mondays et. al. -- made up much of the soundtrack of my life, providing a sympathetic and melodic backdrop to my teenage insecurities. The city seemed to have a sound and style, and both were farther-reaching than I knew, as I would come to learn reading recent books on the subject: Tony Wilson's novelization of 24 Hour Party People and Dave Haslam's Manchester, England. As far as pop culture phenomena, it's hard to beat what happened in Manchester between 1976 and 1991.

Sprinkled with a cast of legendary local characters, Michael Winterbottom's 24 Hour Party People profiles a man, two bands, and a large building. Tony Wilson is the TV journalist turned scene doctor, Joy Division the revolutionary band that got his record label off the ground, and Happy Mondays the drug-crazed lot who virtually ran it back into the ground. Then there's a bank-breaking little venture called the Hacienda club, where rave culture sucked its first pacifier. With dialogue and details enhanced for maximum cinematic moxie, the story is basically true.

As his Factory fortunes wax and wane, Wilson keeps his day job as a reporter for Granada TV, his documentary exploits conspiring with his pop-culture creations to cast Manchester itself as a certain love of his life. The story begins with the filming of a daredevil piece wherein Wilson demonstrates hang gliding for the uninitiated. Cameras rolling, he soars, descends, and nearly clotheslines himself on a barbed-wire fence. He then addresses the movie audience, saying that yes, this really did happen, and that it should be taken symbolically. "I... don't want to spoil the narrative. But I'll just say 'Icarus'." And if we're not hip to this mythical character? "You should probably read more," Wilson says now and throughout (he went to Cambridge, he also likes to mention). So I looked up the Greek fellow, and it turns out that he too took an unhealthy liking to cutting-edge design and fiscally irresponsible pop bands. But I won't spoil the narrative either.

Wilson's story is a simple one, and the filmmakers' literary threads (rock pics seem to love them of late) don't drown in their own pomp. Things are left to unfold through the figures we've paid to see. Playing Joy Division's Ian Curtis, Sean Harris reminds us that the tragic frontman wasn't all gloom and doom. His jerky onstage dance is priceless, as is the entire re-creation of the band's early gigs at Wilson's fledgling Factory club. There's Danny Cunningham as Happy Mondays' Sean Ryder (a dragon-chasing Yeats for the E generation?); Paddy Considine as Factory partner Rob Gretton; and John Simm, Ralf Little, and Tim Horrocks as the guys of Joy Division/New Order. Then there's the scene-stealing Andy Serkis as Factory producer Martin Hannett. Looking like Don Was and acting like Phil Spector, Serkis' Hannett is a surly, eccentric genius balancing the demands of revenge, hard living, and stellar drum sounds. And if you don't blink, you can catch cameos by famous musical Mancs like the Buzzcocks' Howard DeVoto, The Fall's Mark E. Smith, and the Mondays' Paul Ryder.

Bands come and go, and so does Wilson's luck, but the audience always wins. Whether you're a music fan, a movie fan, or someone who's already seen Scooby-Doo, you'll find much to love in 24 Hour Party People. Wilson will tell you that, when it comes to truth versus legend, go with the legend. But as his own story will attest, sometimes truth just makes good fiction

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