By John Corrado
Before Noel and Liam Gallagher, the rockstar brothers behind Oasis, actually took the stage again for the first show of their 2025 reunion tour in Cardiff, the idea that they would ever truly make amends, let alone walk out on the same stage holding hands, didn’t seem like a sure thing until it finally happened.
Even the announcement of the English rock band’s big comeback tour in 2024 was met with ample speculation over whether or not the long-quarrelling siblings would be able to actually hold their truce and stick together long enough to make it through the tour without fighting.
In their triumphant documentary Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger, co-directors Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace (Shut Up and Play the Hits) not only capture the Oasis Live ‘25 reunion tour and everything that went into it. They have also crafted a film that feels like nothing short of a celebration of Oasis and what this band means to so many fans. It captures the high I felt seeing them perform live at Rogers Stadium in Toronto last year, which is exactly what I wanted from the film.
The opening scenes of Don’t Look Back in Anger show the meteoric rise of the band from Manchester throughout the 1990s, until it all came crashing down in 2009, with a tour-ending fight between the two Gallagher brothers before they were set to take the stage in Paris. They stopped speaking to each other for fifteen years afterwards. This provides context for why it was so meaningful to have them back together, and also provides the emotional through-line of the film, which is really about forgiveness.
Woven into the film are excerpts from a Manchester priest’s sermon, using the Gallagher brothers as an example to talk about forgiveness. It ends an undertone to the film that feels Biblical. None of this would’ve been possible, we are being reminded, if the brothers themselves didn’t find it in their hearts to forgive, something that Noel says early on he has never been able to do. But, clearly, something changed. Whether it was age, or seeing what the band’s rock anthems mean to a new generation of fans.
We get moving testimonials from a variety of fans throughout the film, with a core theme being the young people who have found meaning in their music despite barely having been born when they first got big in the nineties (this was exemplified by the amount of teenagers I saw in their bucket hats and zipped up parkas at the show last year).
Through a flurry of impressive editing and thrilling performance footage, Southern and Lovelace’s film balances being a behind-the-scene look at the tour and also a tribute to the enduring power of these songs. Despite not being a full concert film, Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger works in some blazing performances from different cities, as the filmmakers largely follow the concert’s setlist (with a few exceptions). The images not only benefit from being seen in IMAX, but it’s worth hearing it in that format, too; this is a film that is meant to be played loud.
It captures the genuine excitement around the tour. In one scene, we are a fly-on-the-wall to the police chief preparing his troops for the concert (with some Oasis puns, to boot), warning them that the crowd of excited spectators will be more akin to that of a football match. We see the rebellious fans in Manchester who couldn’t get tickets, but crowded the park around the venue to experience the show for free, spurred on by a sense of hometown pride and a feeling of ownership over the band. The Gallagher brothers are the working class guys who made it big, becoming the biggest rock band on the planet at their peak.
The central figures behind it all are Noel and younger brother Liam, who appear candid throughout. They touch on feeling an obligation to return at a time of so much darkness in the world, when their music and reunion tour can provide a sense of unity and hope. For Oasis fans, Don’t Look Back in Anger feels jubilant, and if you were at the show, it offers a thrilling chance to relive the experience of seeing them live. But it also works on a purely emotional level as a portrait of two brothers healing their relationship through music
The concert itself was a melt-your-face-off experience of having them tear through the hits for roughly a hundred minutes. On a personal note, I will never forget the stratospheric high of hearing them perform “Live Forever” (in the pouring rain at my outdoor show, no less), or the unforgettable finale of “Wonderwall,” “Don’t Look Back in Anger” and “Champagne Supernova.”
The performance footage here is poignantly intercut with closeups on faces in the crowd, revealing the jubilation of seeing fans – both young and old – singing their hearts out and wiping away tears. That’s the power of music – and also Oasis – on full display.
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