The Melbourne International Film Festival is in the process of being streamed online, but one film revealed at the launch of their program will not stream.
At the end of July, the show of Sandra Wollner’s The Trouble With Being Born was pulled from the festival after it was given “expert advice ” and a subsequent consult with the community”.
The festival raised concerns about the “safety and health” of the general public. It is clear that this Austrian film was not a popular choice from the beginning – it depicts (albeit not in a clear manner) an adulterous man’s abuse of a robot kid.
The premiere of the film in Berlin in the spring of this year was controversial, securing both walk-outs from the audience and a Jury Prize.
This is the most recent in a series of films that is pushing viewers to the brink of extreme discomfort. What is the limit of how to go for cinematic representation?
“Rivers of viscera’
The moral outrage that has been expressed over films that push boundaries has been an infinitely renewable resource. Thomas Edison’s 1896 film of a close-up kiss-up was described as “absolutely shocking” by artist John Sloan, who wrote that “police interference” was justified.
The raunchy films that Hollywood had in the pre-Code period of the late 1930s all the way to the end of the 1970s, were frequently awarded a “condemned” score by the American Catholic Legion of Decency, meaning “see this film and then go to Hell”.
Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange (1971) and David Cronenberg’s Crash (1996) caused a ferocious public outrage following their publication in Britain.
Films such as the film Claire Denis Trouble Every Day (2001) and Bruno Dumont’s Twentynine Palms (2003) prompted Artforum critic James Quandt’s sharp criticism of “New France Extreme” in 2004.
Incredulous, Quandt lamented:
A cinema that is now determined to defy every rule and plunge into rivers of viscera and swells of sperm, and to make every frame awash in flesh or nubile and expose it to every kind of mutilation, penetration, and sexual mutilation.
Inciting outrage
The way we interact with the subject of films that just makes us uncomfortable is unsettling.
Clickbait headlines limit challenging films or violent films down to one-line summaries that enrage or denigrate. The same is true for reviews, which tend to focus on a film’s shocking factor which is why these extreme elements become the film’s cultural contexts.
Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible (2001) is referred to as the ten-minute rape film. Larry Clark’s Kids (1995) is a film about adolescent promiscuity; The film by Pier Paolo Pasolini, Salo (1975) is the film that eats shit.
These definitions are incorrect, it’s that they’re hopelessly simplistic and are akin to knee-jerk displeasure rather than engagement in a critical manner.
According to Variety Critic, Jessica Kiang observes in her review of the film Wollner It is inevitable that the depraved elements are a distraction from the real story:
It will be a difficult task to convince people to think about the ancillary issues that are in a film that is destined to be limited to the ‘child sex-robot film’.
However, the reality that the film deviates from the pedophile plot to look at different, less savage types of exploitation, for example, an elderly woman who is using an android to ease grief is omitted.
As one walks away from Salo it is likely to remember the horrors of torture that are visceral rather than the characters’ lengthy thoughts on power. Or the opening sequence of the film, which is the words “Essential Bibliography” comprising work by Blanchot as well as Beauvoir. However, these aspects of the film matter and shouldn’t be brushed aside in the name of anger.
Differential balance
What is the limit of distance? Legally speaking, in Australia the answer is akin to Classification Act. When deciding on classification, you must consider community norms, the effect on a film’s content, and the setting within which the content is displayed.
Classification boards examine the film’s synopsis in order to find a balance between the freedom and security of the individual. This level of analysis is essential: it assists in making the distinction between gratuity and the purpose.
(While the Trouble of Being Born is not yet classified in Australia the film was accepted to be presented at MIFF as a cultural exclusion.)
Examine the B.B.F.C.’s decision regarding the explicit sexual images within Lars von Trier’s Antichrist (2009). Trier’s film was found to be acceptable for those 18 and over after determining that the film’s intent was not to provoke.
The board, however, deemed Antichrist to be “a serious drama that explores the themes of guilt, loss, grief as well as fear” and that the film’s imagery when considered in its context it was “exceptionally justifiable” in bringing to life the themes and characters of the film.
The possibility of viewing
If the terms “child android sexually explicit film” or “shit-eating torture film” cause you to shiver, that’s good. It’s even more disturbing in the event that they did not.
The fear of going to the film is often tied to the belief that films are only there for entertainment and enjoyment. We can find enjoyment as one of the responses we can expect from a cinema, but it’s not the sole reason for cinema.
The purpose of extreme films is to provoke, irritate and provoke, and are definitely not for everyone.
But to discredit or denounce the films due to our displeasure with their basic basis is to prevent a thoughtful evaluation, not just of the film itself, however, but also one’s own position regarding the boundaries of good taste, or the limits in artistic expression.
If a film has been legally cleared, the question of what is too to be too far should be a concern for each viewer.
