Fight for Your Right

Wandering through Wikipedia, I came across the surprising discovery that one of the 'video nasties' is still banned in the UK.

Fight for Your Life, "The least politcally correct film ever seen", apparently features rape, infanticide and constant racial abuse. This is surprising because, despite the UK's rocky past of censorship, I assumed that all of the video nasties (including cult hits such as The Evil Dead and The Driller Killer) had since been made available, and that the attitudes against them more or less died along with Mary Whitehouse.

However, 13 of the 74 films are still outright banned in England. Even more surprising, Fight for Your Life has been released in a remastered DVD package in America. From the press it receieved, it doesn't sound like the kind of legend that The Evil Dead became, but the difference across the Atlanatic is shocking. That said, American censorship is a bit weird. Kung Fu Hustle was rated the same as The Passion of the Christ. Yeah. What?

Perhaps most interesting is the film Visions of Ecstasy - still banned in the UK, due to blasphemy. Blasphemy? Italy's censorship board has a member from the Roman Catholic Church and they're still more lenient than that. The option to cut offensive scenes from Visions of Ecstasy didn't exist, as the film is only 19 minutes long and they would have been deleting half of the film.

Compared to many countries, UK censorship is (as we would expect) pretty good. Nothing has been banned on a purely political basis; many other countries still can't see Farenheit 9/11 or The Da Vinci Code. Of course, Malaysia banned Babe: Pig in the City, so some people are just unlucky. This is why it's so surprising that there's a film banned due to such a traditionalist reason as blasphemy. It raises questions over our national identity (if there is one); are we still so conservative to place religious views above political ones? This, in turn, questions the need for censorship at all. What exactly is the role of art if artists can't portray and suggest exactly what they'd like? Doesn't that make the film industry just another way in which the government can control the masses?
...Is that what it already is?

Nuggets

• An extra for Indiana Jones 4 casually revealed top-secret plot details in a local newspaper interview.
  

• The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford looks to be one of the best films of the year, and it might just restore my faith in Brad Pitt. Who, incidentally, I dreamt was my best friend.

• Early (though limited) press for Neil 'Dog Soldiers/The Descent’ Marshall’s latest, Doomsday, is negative, threatening my hopes for a Malcolm McDowell revival.
  

• McDowell is also in Rob Zombie’s remake of Halloween. Just…just forget it.
  

• George Romero’s latest in the Living Dead saga, however, looks very, very interesting. Diary of the Dead will be set on the same night as Night of the Living Dead, with a group of students making a horror film in the woods when they are attacked by zombies. The production is independent, as opposed to the glossy studio thrills of Land of the Dead, but The Weinstein Company have bought the rights and guaranteed a wide release.

• Four major sequences in the increasingly awesome-looking The Dark Knight have been shot in IMAX format, with director Christopher Nolan really pushing the possibilities of shooting entire mainstream feature films that way.
  

• Terrence Malick’s favourite film of the last 10 years is Zoolander. Excellent.

Dead yampy, but he baint 'alf bostin'

Mark Locke is a local filmmaker probably best known for his promos for Birmingham band Misty's Big Adventure and cult New York act Jeffrey Lewis. Locke has also made a string of shorts, and a feature film called Crust, about a 7-foot shrimp boxer. That's a 7-foot shrimp that boxes, not a boxer who fights 7-foot shrimp. Although I guess it is about that as well.



The promos are generally fast-paced and colourful, remaining faithful to the songs and allowing them to flourish while exhibiting a sharp sense of deadpan humour. The imagery is often memorable and subversive, such as having Will Oldham beat and rape Jeffrey Lewis, or the nightmarish, sexed-up images of Ten Benson's Tits. Still, that detached sense of humour is never quite lost. While professional, the promos are relatively informal; the handheld camerawork and quick editing maintains that sense of indepedence and freedom.

The shorts, while more structured, are similar. They all maintain a comic streak, often from gross-out or slapstick visual gags. Lube has been described as 'a love story with a difference' - it incorporates bats, popcorn and lubricant gel in a funny and strangely tragic tale of two cinema stewards. The Missing Link is a well-observed mockumentary about an arrogant filmmaker who considers himself saviour of the lower classes, and his inevitable downward spiral when he battles a smug businessman. All of the films are totally unpredictable, constantly taking the audience by surprise with a well-placed line of dialogue or visual punchline.

If there's any theme running through Locke's work, it's that particular Midlands viewpoint that life is rarely as cool as what we see on screen, due to the failings and disappointments of reality. Whether it's showing a pack of sexy vampires changing into sneakers for a chase, or the unforunate effect of too much fake tan, the characters in Locke's work are never quite as cool as they think they are. This is probably shown best in the brilliant promo for Blaze's Hollow Head - the song, a thumping heavy metal track, is mumbled by the vocalist, who does little more than watch the telly and drink a cup of tea in his spotless suburban living room.
Another common factor is the brummie accent; almost every character in Locke's films has a very strong one, making them seem that little bit more laughable. I know, I know. But come on. Time to face facts.

There's a DVD of Mark Locke's work available, but you can see most of his work at his website
www.fortmarkfilms.com

A Fitting Tribute

Spike Lee has always been a visible figure, unafraid of tackling or attracting controversies. When his biopic Malcolm X was released, Lee encouraged black students to skip school to see it, and on Real Time with Bill Maher Lee stated that the US government could have been purposefully slow in their response to hurricane Katrina. As each of Lee’s films are defined – regardless of cast or genre – by Lee himself, it was expected that his epic documentary on Katrina, When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts, would give Lee the chance to air his own anger and damning views on the failure of the government’s response.

It came as a surprise, then, to find that Lee doesn’t once appear in the four-and-a-half hour film, nor does any voice over or ironic captions. Lee literally lets the city speak for itself, interviewing dozens of survivors, politicians, scientists and New Orleans residents. The result is a film that displays, while a collective voice of anger, many different figures to place the blame on. A case is offered for why everyone involved was guilty, be it Bush, FEMA, the engineers, the military, or Mayor of New Orleans Ray Negin (who is also interviewed, and features prominently). Individual residents’ stories are pieced together from over 500 hours of footage to display a harrowingly realistic portrait of the events. Stars involved such as Sean Penn and Kanye West are given very little screen time, as Lee knows that they can’t tell the story of the forgotten underclass that is at the heart of the tragedy.

This displays a maturity and desire for the truth that should define documentary filmmaking; a far cry from the Nouvelles Egotistes like Michael Moore and Nick Broomfield. The information is not filtered through one singular figure, which means that it achieves a purity and objectivity not often seen in the recent documentary renaissance. The press made a fuss over Lee’s supposed belief that the levees were dynamited by the government, in order to drown the city; in fact, this theory is put forward by a handful of residents (who remember that the levees were exploded in 1927). Others in the film say that this theory does not stand up, and there is no substantial evidence to support it. The point of including this in the film is not to provoke conspiracy theories; it’s simply that the voices of all the people need to be heard.

Also admirable is the film’s comprehensive view of the tragedy; in four acts, Lee examines the build up to the hurricane, the horrific floods, the political response and ramifications, and most interestingly, the cultural loss that Katrina brought with it. New Orleans is famed for being a unique city, a multicultural milieu originally both a thriving slave trade and the place where slaves could find freedom. Often, Lee’s film diverts away from Katrina itself to examine what has been lost in the unique traditions in the music and communities of the city. We are given a description of the New Orleans “jazz funeral” – a funeral procession played by a brass band, first playing solemn hymns and then upbeat swing. One stunning sequence in the film shows a jazz funeral played for New Orleans itself; this is the film’s most intensely emotional moment, as it encapsulates the entire city’s anger, grief and helpless disappointment at the disaster.

The literal loss of New Orleans is also devastating; the black and poor evacuees were dispersed all over the country in need of refuge, effectively destroying entire communities. This sheds light on the drastic differences and injustices displayed geographically across America, and perhaps reflects the social dislocation experienced by the American underclass. As the camera moves through endless rubble and devastation in a post-Katrina New Orleans, the audience is left to contemplate not only how the city can begin to rebuild, with poor schooling and fewer children, but also why these communities return. The truth is, the New Orleans residents need to hold on to what they have. They are in no position to either help or harm the government, and still need a place to exist in America.

The film’s approach to narrative is to join together personal stories, but this does not restrict the ambitious scope of the polemic – on the contrary, the points being made are only heard louder when coming from dozens of voices. The interviewees are so varied that the subjects touched upon include global warming, 9/11, insurance, oil and the war in Iraq – almost a catalogue of America’s ills, illuminated by a major national tragedy. The film is unafraid of questioning America’s legacy in the wake of emergencies; why, if Katrina was a disaster on a larger scale, with a more substantial loss, will be 9/11 be commemorated and acted upon more?

Free from irony or ego, When the Levees Broke is documentary filmmaking at its best, a reminder of the importance of cinema to explore every triumph and failure of a nation. The film ends with the second part of the New Orleans funeral march – the upbeat swing dance, a celebration of life. A more suitable ending couldn’t be imagined for a film that is not only important as a revelation of the tragedies of Katrina, but also as a celebration and tribute to New Orleans, a place that has been otherwise left behind by America.