The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

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knives
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#26 Post by knives » Mon Apr 01, 2013 8:37 pm

Likewise I've always wondered if Frankenheimer's The Horseman has even been released there let alone uncensored.

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manicsounds
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#27 Post by manicsounds » Mon Apr 01, 2013 10:33 pm

Argue why British companies bother to release cut versions of movies when uncut is available elsewhere, but even Eureka! decided to release "The Human Centipede 2" in its cut form (although not for animal cruelty).

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GaryC
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Re: Second Sight Films (UK)

#28 Post by GaryC » Tue Apr 02, 2013 2:07 am

zedz wrote:
peerpee wrote: (the long cut of ANDREI RUBLEV, if it ever gets released here, will suffer too).
Isn't the offending scene in both versions of the film? [/nitpick]
The scene is extended in the long cut - while the horse is lying on the ground, someone comes up and spears it.

Artificial Eye's 2002 DVD release of the 180-minute cut (a port of the Ruscico edition) actually contains the uncut horse scene. I suspect this is by accident and not because the BBFC passed it, as there is no submission record of the DVD on the BBFC's database. I suspect someone at Artificial Eye didn't submit the DVD because they already had a homevideo certificate (from their film reissue and VHS release of 1991, which was I understand precut before subnmission - I asked them about this at the time) and didn't realise that the Ruscico DVD edition wasn't identical to that version.

I'm divided on this. I certainly don't approve of animal cruelty or killing just to make a film, but then again I have watched and own copies of both versions of Andrei Rublev (admittedly when I first saw the film, at the NFT in 1987, I hadn't been aware of the horse scene going in) and Cockfighter (can't say I wasn't warned by the title there). I suppose I appreciate the films while disapproving of some of their methods.

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MichaelB
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#29 Post by MichaelB » Tue Apr 02, 2013 2:34 am

bdsweeney wrote:How does the start of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid stand in the UK? Just curious ... :-"
The film has been cut by approximately ten seconds every time it's been submitted for classification.
manicsounds wrote:Argue why British companies bother to release cut versions of movies when uncut is available elsewhere, but even Eureka! decided to release "The Human Centipede 2" in its cut form (although not for animal cruelty).
The first film was one of Eureka's biggest ever hits, which might explain that.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#30 Post by Perkins Cobb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 2:50 am

We discussed the morality of this at length last year. I still take the position of refusing to second-guess the ethics of the filmmaker in terms of destroying animals in order to achieve his/her vision; if I were on the set, I might voice an objection, but once it's an image, it's just an image. Frankly, I'm critical of viewers who turn away from Cimino's horse falls (just as I'm critical of myself for wimping out on Brakhage's autopsy footage); it's a form of failing to engage.

The censoring of films for this reason is so barbaric that I have the urge to move to the UK, license Cockfighter, and put it out uncut, just to get some press attention for the absurdity of this law. Don't have much else going on at the moment; I will throw myself on the grenade!

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TMDaines
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#31 Post by TMDaines » Tue Apr 02, 2013 5:45 am

I would say I agree with you, and I pretty much do, but then I see you posted the following in the previous thread you've just linked to:
I have to admit that I'm of the opinion that art trumps non-human life and that if, say, Sam Peckinpah feels he can only get the shot he needs by blowing up some chickens, then he has the right to do so.
I certainly wouldn't want to go that far. I hate animal cruelty and believe to be cowardly. I hated being in Bulgaria and having to walk past a shitty circus every day where some poor chimps were unfairly tied up in direct sunshine in tiny cages - all for the purposes of entertaining holidaymakers in the evenings. It's just once the deed is done it seems pretty pointless to cut the footage and pretend that it never happened. Like you say, an image is just an image.

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MichaelB
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#32 Post by MichaelB » Tue Apr 02, 2013 7:04 am

Perkins Cobb wrote:The censoring of films for this reason is so barbaric that I have the urge to move to the UK, license Cockfighter, and put it out uncut, just to get some press attention for the absurdity of this law.
You'd certainly get press attention, especially if you openly sought it, but I suspect it might take a slightly different angle from the one that you're hoping for.

Knowing British tabloids as well as I do, I suspect it would mostly take the form of:

1. Turning you into a national pariah (animal cruelty is only one notch above paedophilia in tabloid demonology);
2. Repeated demands as to why you're not being prosecuted for openly admitting to breaking the law;
3. Extensive delving into your private life for material to stretch (1) and (2) out for as long as possible.

And once they got bored with their new chew-toy, they'd probably start lobbying the government to tighten up the law on animal cruelty, as your activities "prove" that it clearly wasn't working well enough before. And the government, facing a potentially tricky election in 2015, would be only too happy to comply - after all, cracking down on animal cruelty is the kind of thing that genuinely does play well to the crowd.

Sadly, all this is based on a great deal of precedent!

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#33 Post by MichaelB » Tue Apr 02, 2013 9:38 am

I can't believe I haven't thought of looking these up before, but these are the various Parliamentary debates regarding the passing of the Cinematograph Films (Animals) Act.

Initial presentation as a Private Member's Bill - 11 February 1937;
House of Commons (second reading) - 9 April 1937;
• House of Lords (second reading) - 6 July 1937;
House of Lords (amendments) - 13 July 1937.

It started out as a Private Member's Bill, originally presented and rejected in 1933/34 but when it was revived in 1937 its passage seems to have been pretty uncontroversial - although the two main debates reveal the arguments that led to the introduction of the Act's two escape clauses (regarding simulated cruelty, and cruelty that would have happened anyway).

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#34 Post by Perkins Cobb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 12:17 pm

MichaelB wrote:
Perkins Cobb wrote:The censoring of films for this reason is so barbaric that I have the urge to move to the UK, license Cockfighter, and put it out uncut, just to get some press attention for the absurdity of this law.
Knowing British tabloids as well as I do, I suspect it would mostly take the form of:

1. Turning you into a national pariah (animal cruelty is only one notch above paedophilia in tabloid demonology);
2. Repeated demands as to why you're not being prosecuted for openly admitting to breaking the law;
3. Extensive delving into your private life for material to stretch (1) and (2) out for as long as possible.
Do you really think it would go that way? I mean, yes, people are dumb, but I'd hope some in the press would rally to the cause of rescuing a banned film (especially if one were prosecuted for doing it). In any case, if I were in a position to do so, it's a cause for which I'd happily martyr myself.

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MichaelB
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#35 Post by MichaelB » Tue Apr 02, 2013 12:37 pm

Perkins Cobb wrote:Do you really think it would go that way?
Based on overwhelming precedent, yes I do. Frankly, you're living in a dreamworld if you think it would go any other way.

Even if you got one or two people prepared to support you, the chances are:

(a) that their voices would be massively drowned out by the opposition, and;
(b) they'd be demonised as animal-torturing perverts as well.

This is not an area where you can realistically expect a nuanced and considered argument if you take it into the wider public arena. Not least because it picks up on two of the perennial British tabloid themes: love of animals and extreme suspicion of so-called 'art'.
Last edited by MichaelB on Tue Apr 02, 2013 12:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#36 Post by Perkins Cobb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 12:50 pm

MichaelB wrote:This is not an area where you can realistically expect a nuanced and considered argument if you take it into the wider public arena.
Granted (it is a world in which George W. Bush can get elected twice), but I'm curious, what are the closest precedents? Has anyone ever tried this with an old movie, and floated the defense that it has nothing to do with harming a real live animal right now?

Edit: And of course the tabloids would see it as an opportunity to go bonkers, as they would in the US, but what about the mainstream press (and viral response)? Wouldn't that carry more weight?

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#37 Post by jindianajonz » Tue Apr 02, 2013 12:58 pm

TMDaines wrote:Like you say, an image is just an image.
I hope this doesn't veer off topic, but if that's your logic, how is releasing a film of animal torture any different than releasing a film of human torture, child pornography, or other such nastiness?

The main intent of banning something like this is to ensure that people don't decide it's more "cost effective" to break the law and accept punishment, but then continue to profit from the event long after justice has been served. Banning films like this isn't an act of censorship as much as a targetted sentence against the filmmaker.

A film like Andrei Rublev is a bit trickier for me to justify. On the one hand, it makes complete sense to me that since this film was made at a time and place where the events were perfectly legal, so it doesn't make sense to "punish" the director when no laws were broken. But this also opens the door for people to skirt the intent of these laws (prevention of cruelty on humans and animals) by going to countries where the laws aren't as strictly enforced. How can you argue that a film like this was made illegally if it was created in a place like Saudi Arabia that doesn't have a constitution?

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mfunk9786
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#38 Post by mfunk9786 » Tue Apr 02, 2013 1:03 pm

The fact that Cache is released uncut in the UK has always confused me.

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MichaelB
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#39 Post by MichaelB » Tue Apr 02, 2013 1:18 pm

Perkins Cobb wrote:Granted (it is a world in which George W. Bush can get elected twice), but I'm curious, what are the closest precedents? Has anyone ever tried this with an old movie, and floated the defense that it has nothing to do with harming a real live animal right now?
I honestly can't see why anyone would. It would be impossible to publicise such an action without owning up to breaking the law, and such a defence would obviously carry no legal weight if it came to a prosecution.

So the only point of such an action would be to publicise the situation in the hope of getting a significant proportion of the media and public behind your cause - but this simply isn't going to happen in a country where opinion polls consistently show an overwhelming support for legislation that protects animals (for a good recent example, see this recent poll - and that's in support of animals that are legally classified as vermin!). Frankly, you're more likely to end up being letterbombed by the Animal Liberation Front.

By "precedents", incidentally, I'm referring to the media treatment of anyone deemed to have anything to do with animal cruelty, if only by association. And of course the treatment of people who use the "but it's art!" defence outside the vanishingly narrow sphere of people who might be inclined to sympathise.
mfunk9786 wrote:The fact that Cache is released uncut in the UK has always confused me.
Both the genuine animal deaths in Hidden and Benny's Video are clean kills. Current BBFC interpretation of the law is that the Animals Act only applies where there is unambiguous infliction of pain - which is how Cannibal Holocaust was passed almost uncut aside from the excision of one shot (if you've seen the film, you can probably guess which one!).

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TMDaines
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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#40 Post by TMDaines » Tue Apr 02, 2013 1:36 pm

jindianajonz wrote:
TMDaines wrote:Like you say, an image is just an image.
I hope this doesn't veer off topic, but if that's your logic, how is releasing a film of animal torture any different than releasing a film of human torture, child pornography, or other such nastiness?
It's an interesting question and one that I don't really have a strong answer for to hand. But again, I'd argue that the real crime is the event that is being depicted rather than the actual recording of such event. Obviously, in this case though, I'm not going to argue that the images should be legal.

I think context is important. There's a difference between an animal suffering in the past for the purposes of a genuine work of art, which was made in a different era when people generally felt differently about things, and in which the spectator isn't supposed to derive direct pleasure from the suffering of the animal. I think that is the key point here. The legitimate killing or suffering of the animal shouldn't be "eroticised". We aren't talking about blatant snuff films here. The BBFC already uses context in other decision-making similar to this.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#41 Post by Perkins Cobb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 1:51 pm

MichaelB wrote:It would be impossible to publicise such an action without owning up to breaking the law, and such a defence would obviously carry no legal weight if it came to a prosecution.
Right, of course, I'm talking about someone doing it as a deliberate act of civil disobedience, rather than trying to sneak Cockfighter out and try to get away with it somehow. In the hopes that actually putting someone in jail (or fining them into bankruptcy) for distributing a forty year-old film widely regarded as a masterpiece might strike some people as, y'know, sort of ridiculous. I can't believe everyone in the UK media would be completely incapable of making the distinction between that and the ongoing practice of fox hunting.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#42 Post by MichaelB » Tue Apr 02, 2013 2:18 pm

Perkins Cobb wrote:
MichaelB wrote:It would be impossible to publicise such an action without owning up to breaking the law, and such a defence would obviously carry no legal weight if it came to a prosecution.
Right, of course, I'm talking about someone doing it as a deliberate act of civil disobedience, rather than trying to sneak Cockfighter out and try to get away with it somehow. In the hopes that actually putting someone in jail (or fining them into bankruptcy) for distributing a forty year-old film widely regarded as a masterpiece might strike some people as, y'know, sort of ridiculous.
It might strike some people as, y'know, sort of ridiculous, but I'm willing to bet a great deal they'll be in a tiny minority. After all, no matter how you spin this, you're defending the distribution of a film containing footage of genuine animal cruelty - and no amount of pleading that it's "widely regarded as a masterpiece" will make any difference to people for whom the animal cruelty is the only salient issue.

Incidentally, when Cockfighter was scheduled to be screened at the Edinburgh Film Festival in 2006, it was withdrawn at the last minute following a complaint by the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, who pointed out that the film unambiguously breached the Animals Act, and that since they had made the Festival aware of this, they couldn't claim ignorance. If I remember rightly, the Festival's programmer still wanted the screening to go ahead (using arguments similar to yours), but the cinema pointed out that knowingly screening an illegal film would put their operating licence at risk.
I can't believe everyone in the UK media would be completely incapable of making the distinction between that and the ongoing practice of fox hunting.
Fox hunting isn't an "ongoing practice"; it was criminalised in 2005. Interestingly, popular support for the ban has risen significantly since it was enforced (57% in 2002, 76% in 2012). And I strongly suspect that if you were to conduct a poll regarding British attitudes towards films featuring genuine animal cruelty, you'd end up with equally overwhelming majorities against - regardless of the film's age.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#43 Post by RossyG » Tue Apr 02, 2013 2:19 pm

Perkins Cobb wrote:The censoring of films for this reason is so barbaric that I have the urge to move to the UK, license Cockfighter, and put it out uncut, just to get some press attention for the absurdity of this law.
You'd be guilty of breaching the 1984 video recordings act before you started. By also ignoring the animal in films law MichaelB referred to, you'd probably be prosecuted.

Like it or not, for most people in Britain, film is an entertainment not an art form. I doubt any newspaper would back you in your quest to make film of a real cock-fight acceptable. They would make little distinction between that and you wanting to televise cock-fighting as a sport.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#44 Post by Mr Sausage » Tue Apr 02, 2013 3:30 pm

TMDaines wrote:I think context is important. There's a difference between an animal suffering in the past for the purposes of a genuine work of art, which was made in a different era when people generally felt differently about things, and in which the spectator isn't supposed to derive direct pleasure from the suffering of the animal. I think that is the key point here. The legitimate killing or suffering of the animal shouldn't be "eroticised". We aren't talking about blatant snuff films here. The BBFC already uses context in other decision-making similar to this.
Well now you have to answer how genuine a work of art it is if it directly contributed to suffering and cruelty.

I'll repost some things I wrote earlier:
Mr Sausage wrote:Art should never be the cause of cruelty and suffering. I do not think that the realm of beauty and pity and sympathy should ever be constructed out of callousness and cruelty. I think those things are antithetical to art. I am not interested in any art made with callousness and cruelty. I do not recognize any art that does this as good, let alone a greater one. People can disagree, but that is where I stand, unequivocally
RE: Rublev:
Mr Sausage wrote:Tarkovsky makes these movies with this passionate and sympathetic feeling for nature and the natural world, and this heightened sensitivity to brutality and corruption, this pity for it. They seem to be movies that are deeply and sensitively felt, and Rublev itself is much concerned with the inhumanity and callousness in the world. And then Tarkovsky goes and does something so forcefully against all of that. Where was his pity, where was his sensitivity when he was forcing this animal to tumble painfully down a flight of stairs perhaps to its death? How could he make a movie so in tune with suffering and so filled with beauty and then stand there so unmoved as this animal was mistreated? I don't understand. It's completely at odds with what he's trying to create and it casts the ingenuousness and seriousness of his entire project in doubt. How can you cause suffering and then use it to explain how much suffering hurts you? Reminds me of Nabokov's example of sentimentality over real sensitivity: Rousseau could weep at the sight of dying flowers, but sent all of his children into workhouses. The feeling is misdirected.

It's such a shame, because there is so much that is beautiful and powerful and amazing in that movie, and it just cuts itself off at the knees with this needless act of cruelty. It's something I wouldn't expect from Tarkovsky and it taints the whole project for me. How can I take what it says seriously when it displays such insensitivity and such a lack of pity?

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#45 Post by Perkins Cobb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:08 pm

It didn't on the first go-round, but it occurs to me now that your Andrei Rublev case is a perfect example of my argument that art (a film exhibiting "this passionate and sympathetic feeling for nature and the natural world, and this heightened sensitivity to brutality and corruption, this pity for it") transcends human behavior (Tarkovsky's willingness to mistreat the horse). Clearly there's a paradox there -- you're willing to throw out the art as tainted by the actions that made it, but I would argue that the result justifies the horse's sacrifice (or at least, comes closer to justifying it than any of the other real-world examples that don't get banned by the BBFC, whether it's a horse racing or a horsemeat Taco Bell taco). Ultimately, I think the films have to be judged completely apart from what went on on the set.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#46 Post by Mr Sausage » Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:22 pm

Perkins Cobb wrote:Clearly there's a paradox there -- you're willing to throw out the art as tainted by the actions that made it, but I would argue that the result justifies the horse's sacrifice (or at least, comes closer to justifying it than any of the other real-world examples that don't get banned by the BBFC, whether it's a horse racing or a horsemeat Taco Bell taco).
It's not a paradox in the slightest. It's just one more example of sentimentality. It's no different from some turn of the century bourgeois couple walking out of a Gorky play with tears in their eyes, waxing poetical about the plight of the poor, and then stepping unnoticed over an actual poor person sitting in the street as they continue their impassioned talk about how terribly the poor are treated. It's a total disconnect from the real world and legitimate human feeling. If you think it's ok to commit cruelty in the name of making a film about how awful cruelty is, you're a moral cretin. Your values are twisted. You become just one more philistine who makes pretentious speeches about the value of art all while missing its actual value. If art--Tarkovsky's film especially--isn't making you more sensitive to the actual cruelties that go on in the world around you, you're enjoying it on nothing more than an empty, superficial level complete with empty, superficial emotions. You're using art as a way not to engage with real life, and that's too bad.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#47 Post by Perkins Cobb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:46 pm

So you're saying that Andrei Rublev can't do any of those things because Tarkovsky corrupted himself (and the film) with a cruel act. But what if the film does make a viewer "more sensitive to the actual cruelties that go in in the world"? Is it redeemed? Or are you suggesting that reaction would somehow be in error (and would it matter whether or not the viewer happens to know if the horse was actually mistreated)? Your Gorky example indicts the spectator for reacting to art and life in different ways -- arguably a risible hypocrisy (albeit a very human one), but that's much less complex than the relationship that exists between spectator, text, and artist. How is Tarkovsky's hypocrisy transferable to the audience? I wouldn't personally push a horse down a flight of stairs but why should I feel a moral imperative to downgrade Andrei Rublev or condemn Tarkovsky because he did?

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#48 Post by zedz » Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:59 pm

Perkins Cobb wrote: I wouldn't personally push a horse down a flight of stairs but why should I feel a moral imperative to downgrade Andrei Rublev or condemn Tarkovsky because he did?
Why wouldn't you condemn Tarkovsky for a horrible act he was responsible for? Substitute "old lady" or "infant" for "horse" in that sentence. If Tarkovsky were the Tommy Udo of Soviet filmmaking, I'd be quite entitled to condemn him for it.

Judging the work of art, I agree, is a different (and very complicated) matter, though in most cases the kind of callousness and cruelty that would contrive such an act will also end up torpedoing the 'artist' in plenty of other ways, so it's a dilemma I usually don't have to face (though I certainly do in the case of Rublyov, but then I also have to deal with the fact that Tarkovsky - and countless other great directors - were often assholes in their personal and professional lives). Judging the person responsible for a reprehensible action is completely justified and absolutely normal.

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#49 Post by Perkins Cobb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 5:05 pm

Well, good point. Yes, I was thinking in the terms that you articulate, i.e. that many great artists are/were assholes and I've long since stopped seeing that as my problem (apart from salacious curiosity about their misdeeds).

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Re: The BBFC and Animal Cruelty

#50 Post by Mr Sausage » Tue Apr 02, 2013 5:05 pm

*sigh*
Perkins Cobb wrote:So you're saying that Andrei Rublev can't do any of those things because Tarkovsky corrupted himself (and the film) with a cruel act. But what if the film does make a viewer "more sensitive to the actual cruelties that go in in the world"? Is it redeemed?
I don't know if the movie is redeemable or not, that's not the point. The point is: the movie is its own indictment. If the viewer becomes more sensitive to cruelty in the world by watching the movie, they also have to become more sensitive to the cruelty committed by the movie. And therein is the problem: the movie contributed to the thing it was bemoaning, which is disingenuous at the very least and calls its moral seriousness and its supposed moral authority into question.
Perkins Cobb wrote:Your Gorky example indicts the spectator for reacting to art and life in different ways -- arguably a risible hypocrisy (albeit a very human one), but that's much less complex than the relationship that exists between spectator, text, and artist.
No, my Gorky example highlights the difference between real sensitivity and sympathy and the empty, inferior imitation of those things: idle sentimentality. If you claim to feel lots of lofty emotions when watching a movie, but cannot muster even an inkling of pity and sympathy for a needless cruelty that actually went on in the world, you have to wonder if there's any real depth or importance in what you claim to feel. Certainly what you've seen and felt doesn't seem to mean a lot or to've made much of a real impression. But you get to make lofty speeches on the internet about the transcendence of art, I guess.
Perkins Cobb wrote:I wouldn't personally push a horse down a flight of stairs but why should I feel a moral imperative to downgrade Andrei Rublev or condemn Tarkovsky because he did?
Comes down to this: "How can I take what it says seriously when it displays such insensitivity and such a lack of pity?"

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