DVD REVIEW: VIDEO NASTIES: THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE 2.

The Amazon review.

Well, here we are again horror fans and enemies of censorship for anyone over 18. And it does indeed seem like we've been here before. Of course it's a good place to be, no doubt about that, but the fact remains that it's a familiar place.

I may be wrong but this feels very much like the material, the content, was compiled at the same time as this DVD's predecessor and omitted simply for space reasons. The locations of the guest reviewers are the same and, though I haven't checked, I wouldn't be surprised if they were wearing the same clothes. The story does, of course, continue with the films that the powers that be thought were video nasties but probably couldn't get a jury to convict them so, fuzz, confiscate any you think you can get away with. It also highlights idiots like David Alton MP instead of Mary Whitehouse and the stupid fuss over Child's Play 3.

The best parts are the critics' perceptive and witty introductions to the films themselves and they usually contain so much footage it's hardly worth watching the actual trailers.

I loved the original documentary, this one I just liked quite a bit. But then we all know about sequels, don't we?

 

Further comments.

 

If find issues of censorship to be fascinating because censors are almost always invariably wrong, particularly in the case of the so-called video nasties. The original furore was superbly analysed in the first documentary which is essential viewing for anyone interested in censorship, not just in film. This sequel takes the story on a little further which looks at the films which the authorities couldn't ban because they'd already been passed by the BBFC (British Board of Film Classification/Censorship) albeit often with cuts, but which the authorities had decidedly uneasy feelings about so encouraged the fuzz to confiscate stock from video stores. Films like John Carpenter's The Thing. The reaction of anyone who has seen this film is -you what? Yes, it is scary and gruesome but it's fantasy violence. There is no way on earth that it could deprave or corrupt anyone. There are no women in it so no sexual violence. Quite often, as the reviewers point out, a film was nicked because they either didn't like the title, the way the distributors publicised it (emphasising horror that just wasn't there) or without even watching it all the way through. 

It's worth noting that most of the original video nasties have now been released uncut in the UK. One, Contamination (contains mild unsadistic disembowelling) with a 15 rating. The few that remain either banned or noticeably cut involve either animal cruelty or hard sexual violence (or both). And yet civilisation hasn't crumbled. How strange.

Now I should come clean here and state that I haven't seen most of the original nasties or those included in this second volume and that despite being an avid lover of horror movies. The reason for this is that the type of horror I prefer contains elements of science fiction, fantasy, the supernatural, but, most importantly, monsters. While I've seen a few slasher movies, most of them didn't do much for me. I certainly don't like films which have explicit sexual violence or violence against women (like many of the cannibal movies do).

Glancing at a couple of shelves of DVDs near me, all I can see in the horror genre are The Evil Dead Trilogy and a couple of movies by cult Italian director Mario Bava including his superb and still scary as heck 60s anthology film Black Sunday (not to be confused with his Black Sabbath his 1960 b/w scary almost as heck vampire movie).

What gets me about would be censors, such as David Alton MP and James Ferman of the BBFC, is their arrogance and elitism. Their attitude is: I have seen these films and while they have not affected me (superior middle/upper class person that I am) they could clearly affect lower class and lesser intelligent adults who lack my ability to discriminate between fiction and reality, therefore I must protect these inferior beings (not that I'd ever admit to thinking of them as such) in order to prevent their baser natures becoming inflamed by the violence and sexuality as seen in these films. An attitude to which I can only respond by saying, "Fuck you, asshole!"

Sorry about that, just my baser nature coming out.

Another reason to get this DVD is because of the informed, perceptive and often witty and lengthy introductions to the trailers by critic, writers, and academics such as Alan Jones (who seems to have known everyone in Brit Horror for the last forty years) and the always congenial Kim Newman, though there are several more and all very good too.

Oh all right, let me lay my position on the line in case I haven't been clear enough: FUCK THE CENSORS! (As painfully as possible.)

DVD:VIDEO NASTIES THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE

 

Back in the 80's when the Nasties furore was at its height, I was a regular borrower of videos from one of those corner shop video libraries. However, what I wasn't, still believing myself to overly squeamish, was a fan of gory horror movies. I remember fellow SF fan Harry Bell describing lurid details from Romero's Dawn of the Dead and Ian Penman insisting that I'd enjoy Evil Dead 2. Oh yeah, sure, like hell. I'd seen enough to clips and trailer of them and similar films for me to realise that I'd run a mile rather than see them. Of course I've now seen DotD several times and The Evil Dead (which I've just bought on Blu-ray) and ED2 are two of my favourite horror movies.

The point I'm leading up to is that at the time while being aware of the moves to ban the Video Nasties, my actual memory of the events surrounding them are vague in the extreme. I have, however, become more familiar with the details through reading various books about horror movies. And now along comes this DVD on the subject.

The focus of the DVD is Jake West's 60 minute documentary about the subject which features original contemporary footage and specially shot current interviews with a variety of horror experts and people who had been involved with the Nasties at the time. One is a smug ex-MP (Tory, unsurprisingly) who hasn't changed his views and another is Martin Barker the writer, then one of the few dissenting voices of reason opposing the witch hunt. West reveals an uncontrollable hysteria in which certain horror movies were put under the blanket Video Nasty label and anyone involved with them could find htemselves prosecuted and imprisoned. The VN's became the source of all the ills and evils in society and banning them was the cure. Barker accurately points out that this resembles the 50's persecution of horror comics, a persecution that was just as pointless and ill-informed. The media (in particular my old friend The Daily Mail -see many previous posts- always the bastion of ignorance and middle-class hysteria) seemed to wage war on these Nasties, prominently publishing the results of spurious surveys one of which claimed 40% of under 7's had watched one. An academic named Cumberbatch (any relation to the actor?) did his own survey which proved that kids would say anything that they thought adults would want to hear and happily claimed to have seen films whihc didn't exist. But watch the DVD for yourself, it's a fascinating revelation of how censorship can creep in through the back door before it even has the legitimacy of legality and is founded on sheer ignorance.

On disc 2 is a compilation of all the trailers to the 39 nasties which were successefully prosecuted and on disc 3, the 33 which were later acquitted. Each trailer has introduction (sometimes extensive, sometimes brief, all interesting) by a variety of writers and academics who can legitimately claim some expertise in the field. There's the usual suspects -Kim Newman, Alan Jones, and Allen Bryce- plus the lesser known but excellent Stephen Thrower. Director West has his mate Emily Booth do a few and she reads lasciviously from a cue card in the same manner she introduces horror movies on the Horror Channel (or Zone Horror or whatever it's called today). There are also a few academics and directors, most notably Dr Patricia McCormack, an Aussie Goth lecturing at a British university. She's very good but her appearance, particularly the nose ring, is a bit of a distraction from what she's saying. It's all good stuff and the sort of thing to be dipped into rather than watched all the way through.

Ironically, over 20 years later, most of these films have been released uncut on DVD and very few remain banned outright and those mostly for scenes of animal cruelty which is something I find hard to argue about. One of them- Contamination, which I've seen- is now, uncut, rated only 15. What we are presented with is an enormously diverse range of films from cheap trash to something approach Art, from exploitation to moral explorations. This set of 3 discs is packed with food for thought and debate -would I Spit On Your Grave have caused the same controversy if released under its original title Day of the Woman? I honestly can't make up my mind if it's sexist or feminist polemic or what.