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  #91  
Old 28th June 2008, 12:09 PM
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The BBFC also passed the killing of a lizard in Mountain of the Cannibal god, though that was killed for 'good fortune' according to the plot.

If the animal is gonna be killed anyway, cameras or not, why do the BBFC cut the killing of the bull in bullfight footage.?
Surely thats art. Performance art.?
I think to allow us to see a bull die in a urine soaked slaughter house tied and hung by its feet, and not be allowed to see it die an honourable death is wrong .

The BBFC also allowed the pig killing scene in Ferox to pass with some trimming .
According to Morgan in an interview, it was an extra who killed the pig as he refused to do so and the guy nearly lost his hand doing it, which Morgan seemed quite pleased about, and to think he has always said the people who watch Ferox are sicko's.

The turtle in Holocaust was a swift death as its head was cut of first, yet the BBFC removed that. Strange. Maybe the fact that Holocaust would be viewed by the working-class and not the arthouse crowd affected that decision .
I wonder if Holocaust was available in subtitled form only would the cuts be any less.?

On Necromantic, in the first film there is a pretty nasty suicide, especially if your male, where a man kills himself at the point of climax while 'self pleasing' himself. The sight of blood and 'other' fluids, although fake looking, is unforgettable.

Last edited by vipco; 28th June 2008 at 12:39 PM.
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  #92  
Old 28th June 2008, 12:41 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vipco View Post
If the animal is gonna be killed anyway, cameras or not, why do the BBFC cut the killing of the bull in bullfight footage.?
The BBFC can't pass scenes if they have been staged for the film, the killing in Apocalypse Now wasn't staged for the film. Also Bullfighting, like cockfighting and dogfighting is illegall in the UK. Documentary footage of bullfighting would be acceptable.

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Originally Posted by vipco View Post
The turtle in Holocaust was a swift death as its head was cut of first, yet the BBFC removed that. Strange. Maybe the fact that Holocaust would be viewed by the working-class and not the arthouse crowd affected that decision .
I wonder if Holocaust was available in subtitled form only would the cuts be any less.?
No chance. The BBFC's view is quite clear the scene shows a killing that was orchestrated by the film makers and the killing is simply not swift enough to consider passing the scene.

By the way there isn't one rule for subtitled films and one for non subtitled.

Last edited by Angel; 28th June 2008 at 12:44 PM.
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  #93  
Old 28th June 2008, 02:17 PM
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I'm just wondering whether the supposed "remake" of Tod Browning's "Freaks" has been submitted to the BBFC.

The movie "Freakshow" suffered several minutes of extensive cuts for its German DVD reelase, recently followed by the obligatory "uncensored" Austrian DVD release.

Here's a link to the cuts made to the German release (with pics), sadly the descriptions are in German only:

http://www.schnittberichte.com/schni...php?ID=5381983
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  #94  
Old 28th June 2008, 04:36 PM
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I know there isn't one rule for subtitled films and one rule for dubbed or English language films , what I ment was a film like 'Man Bites Dog' was passed uncut in the 90's, the fact that it was subtitled and B/W im sure were taken into consideration at some point during the classification process , as even by todays standards its still pretty disturbing . Maybe the dark humour saved it as it is quite funny till you realise what your laughing at.
Its much stronger than the then banned Resivoir Dogs ,but passed uncut , 18 cert , and includes a lengthy child murder scene were the killer tells us how annoying kids can be when your trying to kill them.

I remember reading something about 'class' in a censorship book concerning one Head censor .
Im sorry but I cant spell his name correctly ( I think he's the one before JF, started with a T) and it was a while ago from I read the book so im not certain exactly what it said.
I think i'll hunt through my film books and give it a re read as im stuck for a good read at the moment.
Please forgive my lack of spelling knowledge, but what ever way I spell this guy's name it looks wrong.
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  #95  
Old 28th June 2008, 06:12 PM
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Originally Posted by vipco View Post
Im sorry but I cant spell his name correctly ( I think he's the one before JF, started with a T).
The censor before Ferman was actually Stephen Murphy (from 1971-75) though I think the one you mean was John Trevelyan.

His book What The Censor Saw is highly recommended reading.
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  #96  
Old 28th June 2008, 06:47 PM
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Reservoir Dogs was never banned, it video classification was simply delayed. This was because after the death of Jamie Bulger in 1993, the BBFC were put under tremendoud pressure by the media to take action against violent films, and so several films inc The Good Son and Dirty Weekend had their video rating withheld for a short while. But there was never any chance of them being banned, the BBFC were just waiting for the furore to die down. Man Bites Dog however didn't have its video classification delayed, this is because the video was submitted before the death of Bulger. so there was no reason to do the same with this particular film.

By the way I really can't see what the fuss about Man Bites Dog was about. The child murder for example completely lacks detail ie once the blanket is thrown over the boy he is never seen or heard. Compare this with the graphic murder of a child in Fight for Your Life. The rape scene was acceptable to me for an 18. The scene doesn't dwell on the suffering of the woman. I really couldn't see anything else to cut. There was nothing lenient about the uncut rating as far as I could see.

There was a time (many years ago) when the BBFC may have passed scenes in a subtitled film that they wouldn't pass in an English laguage film but I'm quite sure they don't do this anymore. Of course if anyone has any examples it would be interesting to hear what they are.
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  #97  
Old 28th June 2008, 07:09 PM
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A similar thing happened with Natural Born Killers. The release date was due to have been around the same time as the appalling Dunblane massacre. Warner Bros actually asked the BBFC to reconsider passing it (which they couldn't do as they'd already granted it an uncut certificate), so in the end they cancelled the release themselves (for around 5 years).

The only Tarantino film to have suffered BBFC edits has been Pulp Fiction and that was simply a reframing shot (it's still cut today to my knowledge due to the same print being released).

I agree with Angel regarding Man Bites Dog. It isn't particularly explicit in detail and wouldn't have posed a major problem then.
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  #98  
Old 29th June 2008, 01:14 AM
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Strange how I find Man Bites Dog to be disturbing even today, yet films like CH, Guinea Pig , Men Behind the Sun, LHOTL, etc, in their uncut form don't bother me in the slightest .
Just shows how different people are affected by different films. I can actually see how some decisions by the BBFC must be difficult to make .
I think its the way Man Bites Dog can make you laugh out loud at things, then makes you realise that your laughing at some old lady having a induced heart attack, that gets you thinking.
It is a film I do like though.

If the BBFC keep delaying classifying a film, is that not a way of effectively banning a film without actually banning it.?
By delaying the films classification viewing , they are keeping it from the public , which is very much like a unofficial ban to me, even if it is temporary . The film is still being denied a release.
I remember that words similar to that were used reguarding Resevoir Dogs by someone to do with the films distributon , who was complaining about the lose in revenue due to the delay .
Apparently they lost money on the promotion campaign as the films classification came long after its promotion , and also lost alot of money to piracy, as the film was freely available 'unofficially' all over the UK while the official film was held in limbo.

May I ask a question about the BBFC .?
If the BBFC make a decision and classify a film and theres an uproar in the tabloids about it, can they withdraw the classification at anytime and review it, or is the classification final as far as the BBFC's concerned .?
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  #99  
Old 29th June 2008, 06:22 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by vipco View Post
If the BBFC keep delaying classifying a film, is that not a way of effectively banning a film without actually banning it.?
By delaying the films classification viewing , they are keeping it from the public , which is very much like a unofficial ban to me, even if it is temporary . The film is still being denied a release.
Yes you could put it that way although an official ban would mean they found the film to be in conflict with their guidelines and so the film had to be rejected. This wasn't the case with Reservoir Dogs. The BBFC had no problem with it at all. The delay in classifying it was due to media pressure and so of course the BBFC wanted it to look like they were taking some kind of action. Once the situation died down all the films at the time were passed. James Ferman said of Reservoir Dogs "There is very little violence in the film and what violence there is is contextually justified".

Quote:
Originally Posted by vipco View Post
May I ask a question about the BBFC .?
If the BBFC make a decision and classify a film and theres an uproar in the tabloids about it, can they withdraw the classification at anytime and review it, or is the classification final as far as the BBFC's concerned .?
The classification is final under the terms of the VRA. In any case the BBFC don't take the tabloids very seriously these days.
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  #100  
Old 29th June 2008, 06:37 AM
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Freakshow hasn't as yet been classified, Peter. It does look very gruesome looking at those stills but I think it's unlikely that it would be cut here.
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