pinku films- BBFC tangent

[Jasper Sharp]

As a brief diversion into the idiosyncracicies of the retarded British
censorship system, I have another question. I'm a Brit living in the
Netherlands at the moment and have noticed that a large number of the video
shops here, in Brussels and also in Paris have sections filled with British
imports. Some films are available on BBFC certificated video imported from
the UK long before they receive a theatrical release ('Sliding Doors' to
cite an example from last year). 
Obviously then reverse of this does not happen in the UK, to the extent that
a good proportion of my video collection which I have ammassed since being
in Europe could technically be impounded by HM Customs should I ever decide
to return to live in the the UK. And I'm not talking about the sort of
videos or DVDs that you might think of buying in Amsterdam. See the letter
in a recent edition of 'Sight and Sound' in which someone details having an
early Jean Luc Godard video bought from France confiscated due to it
obviously not having a BBFC sticker. Thus I can look forward to kissing
goodbye to DVDs of Seijun Suzuki's 'Branded to Kill', Argento's 'Tenebrae'
(4 seconds longer than the UK version), and Jess Franco's 'Succubus', never
certified for a video or DVD release in the UK. Even my Dutch subtitled
releases of Mike Leigh's 'Career Girls' and Erick Zonca's 'La Vie Revee Des
Anges' are surely at risk.
What I am leading to is this - Surely one of the fundaments of the European
Union is the concept of free-trade. Making it illegal to import any video
not certified in Britain surely contravenes this right, especially as UK
distributors can sell their product abroad without such restrictions.
Censorship in Britain has become a little more relaxed with the long overdue
departure of James Ferman last year, but at the same the whole system in
light of European law is rather dubious. 

Jasper Sharp


-----Original Message-----
From: Pete Tombs [mailto:petetombs at paganfilms.freeserve.co.uk]
Sent: Saturday, April 08, 2000 9:33 AM
To: KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
Subject: Re: pinku films- Bedroom


What on earth do you mean by 'strictly speaking the BBFC itself doesn't cut
anything.'?

I know only too well, from having submitted many films to them, that the
BBFC do indeed INSIST on cuts before a certificate is issued. As it is
illegal to release commercially any video in the UK without a BBFC
certificate, I would maintain that it is the BBFC and certainly not the
distributor in these cases who are making the cuts.


Pete Tombs

----- Original Message -----
From: <wlt4 at mindspring.com>
To: <KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Sent: Friday, April 07, 2000 8:20 AM
Subject: RE: pinku films- Bedroom


> >What would be cut out of this? As restrictive as they are, I can't >see
the BBFC cutting out anything that Eirin had left in.
>
>
> According to the BBFC, 13 seconds were cut from the film as submitted to
them.  It's apparently common for the distributors to make cuts *before* the
initial submission so there might be even more missing.  And >
> LT
>