Hi all

Having spent the last year working with filmmaker Richard Butchins on his latest project "The Last American Freakshow", you can imagine how excited I was to learn that it was due to be screened this week in its unfinished form by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts! Except... now it isn't! The powers that be have decided that the film is seemingly "too challenging" for their audience.

The Last American Freakshow is a fly-on-the-wall documentary that follows a band of able-bodied and disabled artists as they travel the West Coast in what's billed as "America's last travelling Freakshow". It's true, the film does deal with some difficult issues - perhaps most importantly, how disabled people are treated and portrayed in society - so the fact that it's been specifically chosen by the organisers of X'08, the eighth London international disability film festival, as a highlight of their 4-day event makes the decision by BAFTA even harder to understand.

But they always say no publicity is bad publicity and The Last American Freakshow is now at the centre of a storm of criticism over BAFTA in the UK daily papers. You can read more about the film in:

The Guardian

The Times and

The Independent

And you can watch a short trailer on YouTube.

All the best

Rowan

The PC Taleban just love to step in to protect people whether they actually want to be protected or not. If the participants in the film are happy about the way that they have been portrayed then who the are BAFTA to deny them a voice? The fact that the film has been chosen for a disability-themed festival might be a bit of a give-away about the way real disabled people feel about it, but the Taleban just want them back in their boxes where they can be kept safely dependent.

Orwell's Big Brother is alive and well and living in Islington.

David

Hi David

That seems to be pretty much the consensus of opinion. When BAFTA discribe the film as too "challenging" for their audience, it's worth remembering that the screenings were planned largely for media-industry professionals and those with direct knowledge of the issues raised...

The Last American Freakshow has been described as being highly "explicit" - well, there is some occasional bad language, so it probably wouldn't go out un-cut on TV before the 9 o'clock watershed, but its real explicitness is in dealing with some uncomfortable topics in an open and honest way. Unlike so much "reality TV", this wasn't constructed for the cameras - it's shot as it happened by a disabled director/cameraman who shared the stresses of life on the road.

Jennie Kermode has written an interesting piece about the saga on Eye For Film looking at not only The Last American Freakshow, but discussing the role that it and films like it have in raising our awareness of important issues.

All the best

Rowan

If these people can accept the way they are why can´t everybody else? This kind of censorship could easily be drawn on a chilling parallel with Nazism,first get them out of site, then stick a tube from the exhaust to the inside of the bus,Hey Presto,as if they never existed anyway. How dare this woman think that she has the divine right to decide what is "challenging" for viewers. People should be given the choice to watch it if they decide to. I´m quite sure that this kind of censorship is based on the belief that they need hiding & protecting. It´s just my opinion but I think that their freedoms of speech & expression have been infringed on the word of just one mis-aligned woman with the power to do so. Has anybody actually seen them perform?

What is the BAFTA exactly?

Shaun

British Academy of Film and Television Arts

So these folks decide which movies get released and which ones don't?

No Shaun, that is the British Board of Film Classification . This is about BAFTA not screening it at their own event.



PS. Actually, the BBFC rarely decide that a film can't be released, but they give the films their age classification.

On this side of the pond, we have the MPAA who are tasked with the same job. They can't ban a movie and a movie maker does not have to submit his/her film for rating, however, the mainstream theatre chains will rarely screen and won't promote an NC-17 film, one deemed not acceptable to anyone iunder 17 even with a parent or guardian, nor will they typically screen unrated movies. Independent theatres, which are few and far between, may pick these up if there's artistic value.

The system was put in place roughly about 1967 when conservative types were getting their undies all in a knot at the proliferation of naughty bits being seen in the movies. Initially, there were G, PG, R and X ratings with no indication of why the rating was put in place. Serious film makers balked at having their mature and serious works getting the same X rating as pornos, so the X was dropped and NC-17 was instituted. In the early 80's, PG-13 was added, primarily as a result of Poltergeist, which was thought to be too scary for the youngest kidlets but not in the same class as Fridaty the Thirteenth.

As to Freakshow, I stumbled across a Youtube clip linked at another site which purports to have a "clown" drinking gasoline then turning his manhood into a flamethrower. I don't think this is making the Cineplex at mall anytime soon.

As to portraying the disabled...my state has clear regulations about exploitation and being photographed for commercial purposes. I suspect the BAFTA group, found this movie to be treading a serious ethical minefield.

Hi Al

Ironically, one of the many issues the Last American Freakshow covers is the inconsistencies in US state laws - some of which, in trying to protect the Freaks (their term) from exploitation, unintentionally descriminate against them themselves by deeming the physically disabled mentally incapable of deciding how they wish to be seen. Richard Butchins conducted a lengthy interview with noted US disabilities lawyer, Brigham Fordham, (himself disabled by a sports injury) that occasionally leaves you scratching your head in disbelief.

But that's all a bit of a moot point, because I don't think it influenced the BAFTA's decision not to show the unfinished film as part of a disability film festival in London.

All the best

Rowan