In 2001's Music for One Apartment and Six Drummers, the titular six drummers break into an average suburban apartment and proceed to improvise a musical piece in each of the rooms, using whatever they find there as percussive instruments. The 10 minute short was a delightful audience pleaser (poke around on Youtube, and you'll find it). Sound of Noise is basically the same film all over again, but on a feature film and city-wide scale. It shouldn't work, but somehow, gloriously, it does.

The heroes or villains of the story, depending on how you look at it, are a group of beat-obsessed anarchist musicians. They find the music of their city deplorable and oppressive, and so they plan a series of musical terrorist attacks/performances to change the city's tune and open its citizens' ears to something new. They forge ahead and soon draw the attention of the police. In charge of the investigation is Amadeus Warnebring – the older son and ironically tone-deaf, black sheep of a famously musical family.

Sound of Noise doesn't quite live up to its shorter predecessor, simply because the music here isn't quite as immediately memorable and catchy, and there isn't enough of it. The unfolding of the plot steals precious time that could otherwise have been filled with more music. It's got a LOT of charm though – there's even a sweet, unexpected romance of sorts – and the loopy story is surprisingly entertaining in its own right. It's not just a flimsy crutch to lean all the percussion bits on. Mainly it is, of course, but not entirely. Ultimately, Sound of Noise more than lives up to expectations, managing to be something more just than the cinematic equivalent of an iPhone app pathetically zoomed up to iPad size by a mocking 2X button. Play it loud!