As we all know, Cine Excess V starts on Thursday and it's featuring a whole host of Shameless/Argent goodies!
First up is the new edit of
Cannibal Holocaust which is being screened Thursday 26 May at the Odeon, Covent Garden courtesy of Shameless Screen Entertainment who will be releasing this on DVD and Blu-ray later in the year. The new edit will have much of the sight of the animal cruelty removed, although the fact of it will still remain. Shameless have been so good as to pass on a statement from Ruggero Deodato himself (also appearing at Cine Excess) explaining his intentions behind the new edit:
Quote:
Statement issued by Ruggero Deodato relating to his New-Edit of CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST for SHAMELESS SCREEN ENTERTAINMENT.
At the time, I would have preferred not to kill the animals during the making of the film, but this was requested by the production who were at a film market selling the film to foreign territories; we’d sent them some early dailies and the producer kept calling us, from the film market to the set in the jungle, asking us shoot increasingly bloody scenes.
I would not change anything to the film, its structure and content, aside from the fact that, now - thirty years later - I’ve reassessed the way the animals were dealt with. Now I would not do it. Yet, in order to preserve the narrative and the impact of the film, you need the killing of the animals in the same way that you need the fictional killing of the humans, the Indios, but now I would have used a trick - I would find a solution to convey the horror without actually killing the animals.
Also, I respect the ways and sensitivities of individual countries, and in this particular case of the United Kingdom; this is why I chose to minimise the scenes of animal killings in my re-edit for Shameless Screen Entertainment: we did this new edit very carefully in a manner which nonetheless keeps the strength and sense of the film because the narrative demands that we feel the unbearable impact of the killing of the animals. What we have done is to substitute footage only removing scenes which were surplus to the minimum visuals needed to convey the message. That surplus is either the actual moment of the kill or moments which I felt were too long or which undermined the dignity of the animal in the intimate moment of its death. In my youth, growing up, I spent a lot of time in the country close to animals and therefore often seeing the moment of their death due to the necessity of the farmers – to eat or sell the animal. In CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST, the death of the animals although unbearable - especially in a present-day urban mind-set - always happened in order to feed the films characters or the crew both in the story and in reality.
But also, we need to bear in mind the reality of the location which meant that the indigenous people who worked with us on the set, ate all the animals which were killed during the filming and that, in fact, the crew ate the pig as we’d been without any meat for weeks by then!
I’ve been told that I have actually edited much more footage than the English censors had required. I’m very pleased that they have finally considered my film, maybe taking it a bit more seriously and that they’ve not cut it more than needed! And I’m also very happy that my decision to modify parts of the film came from my personal reassessment of the film rather than being dictated by censorship. |
Also on Thursday is a censorship debate on Deodato's
House on the Edge of the Park. Although the film itself is not being shown - it will be
released by Shameless later this year.
On Saturday 28 May, following an appearance by Franco Nero, there will be a screening of
Django, courtesy of Shameless' sister company, Argent Film.
Sam will be keeping us current with updates from Cine Excess, but in the meantime, are you going? Are you looking forward to all the Shameless/Argent fun?