Riots. Cinema. Etc.

Whilst taking a bit of a risk, I’m going to attempt to write about something serious this time. Most risky of all, here follows an attempt to boil down a generation old debate into a few hundred words and a couple of Googled jpegs. So...........whilst discussing the recent riots in the capital this morning, and the media influence at the heart of it, I heard the following:

“Kids want I-Pods these days coz’ they’re told they need them, and music and films just back up this view without addressing consequence”.

Anarchy, in a nifty hat.

My first reaction was along the lines of “wait a minute you fucking idiot....” but then I thought about it for a minute (a few seconds). What if it’s too easy to rule out how much sway film (for the purpose of this rambling) can have? What if the notion of personal responsibility is compromised and undermined by a non-stop barrage of role models and characters doing exactly what they shouldn’t?

I’ve heard various stories over the years of the impact 1971’s ‘A Clockwork Orange’ had at the time, a film which mesmerised and terrified in equal measure and, as is usually the case, was really only appreciated when history got a hold of it. Some of the themes of Kubrick’s picture remain highly relevant, perhaps uncomfortably so. The public fear of being victims of apparently random crime, the threat of violence for the sake of violence.  These are crimes which prey on the mind of many a citizen 40 years later. The extraordinary becoming horrifically ordinary.

Ron Weasley

Irresponsible film-making?

But I wasn’t around to gauge that in ’71, so the first real recollection of film being partly blamed for society’s woes  for me came in 1993, with the case of murdered toddler Jamie Bulger.  The perpertrators of the crime were themselves children, and whatever other, more important details of the case, one thing sticks in my mind. The constant reference to the film ‘Child’s Play’, horror films and video nasties which had ‘a’ part to play in the horrible event.

The issue of censorship once again loomed large. Why were children allowed to watch such films? Where were the parents? But most of all, why were these films allowed to be made/watched/thought of at all? In reality, there is no perfect answer.

Don't you wanna be him

But there are a few truths.  Firstly, no film-maker is dumb enough (I hope) to ever enter a project with the intention to incite anything other than debate or restrained argument.  Did the writer/director of ‘Child’s Play’ (i forget/can’t be bothered to find his/her/it’s  name) intend to provoke violence or events mirroring their own work? Of course not.

But here’s the real debate. I’ve seen countless films such as ‘Goodfellas’, ‘Kidulthood’, ‘Romper Stomper’,  ‘City of God’, ‘Scarface’ and a thousand more which show, at times in graphic detail, the dire personal consequences that such violence, such materialism, such lack of respect for all people and all things, can lead to.

Keeping us safe and guarding  us from...stuff.

Then there’s the more subtle, satirical slant of movies such as ‘Taxi Driver’ and ‘Bowling for Columbine’, citing disaffected youth as a by-product of circumstance and society. But here’s the thing. Most, and I use that word loosely, of the thugs, and I use that word strongly, don’t understand the subtext. Or maybe more worryingly, they don’t care.

The most overt films, which graphically show the dire consequence of materialism and ‘take take’ of society, don’t resonate. Tony Montana gets his comeuppance. So what? They remember the drugs, the one liners, the beds draped with dollar bills, the champagne,  the chainsaw, the whole excess of it all. Do they care that De Palma balanced this with tragedy and disaster? Do they bollocks. 

Disaffected youth.

In more recent times, and probably more applicable to what we’ve recently seen on the streets of London, are films like Noel Clarke’s ‘Adulthood’. So Clarke makes sure his protagonist doesn’t end up a hero, doesn’t get the girl, doesn’t have, well, anything. Does it matter? Nope. It’s the faux gangster lifestyle that's initially dressed up as attractive, the reliance on only things that can be bought, stolen, or fought for, including people.  Here, and for all films lost on those who can’t even see the lines let alone read between them, moralising and attempting to show balance is redundant.

If we live in a world the ‘disaffected’ (in place of a few harsher labels) simply take without conscience, why should we be surprised if they simultaneously feed on a films' glamour and extremity without a care for the underlying truths? And these are just the obvious examples, the cases where a character so brazenly pays a price for a misspent lifesyle.

If the most blatant messages are missed, then what hope do the nuanced, intricately woven meanings and subtexts making their way into the psyche of an individual not capable of interpreting them correctly? None.  Absolutely none.

French unrest. In black & white. Must be serious.

But who does a film maker create for? The biggest audience?  The lowest common denominator? Themselves? At times, maybe all three. I heard it on a number of occasions that ‘Child’s Play’ was the ‘trigger’ which prompted Bulger’s killers to act. Perhaps this is true. But if they hadn’t have watched it, let’s not pretend they wouldn’t have found a replacement trigger pretty fast.

Asking whether advertising, TV, music, education, etc is responsible for recent events is a question for all, and one to which their probably won’t be any definitive answers, or perhaps even answers at all. But for film, as with any art, the answer is simple. No matter what subtexts or hidden meaning a movie conceals, any positive notions are in the eyes and ears of the beholder.  And when a movie purports to be responsible in it’s entirety, there will always be those ignorant enough to view extremes as a call to action.