Movie News

I was earwigging on a Twitter conversation about the possibility of a film being released by the distributors Third Window Films. It revealed that declining sales for physical disks coupled with pay per minute film censorship fees by the BBFC were leading to longer niche market films being unviable for release in the UK.

Third Window were asked about the possibility of the release of the two and a half hour film Red Post on Escher Street . Third Window responded:

To be honest, the only things putting us off is the fact that the BBFC charge by the minute (making it an expensive release) and are raising their prices again, plus the fact it's been bootlegged big time already

[it's] Not the cuts as much as the costs! It's why we try to release short films as much as possible!

And referring to a previous release of a long film, Third Window said:

BBFC was a little cheaper back then, but the market was much better so you could take chances on longer films. Yes, with dwindling sales, expensive costs of bluray production and BBFC, it's much harder nowadays.

Nabab LLB is a 2020 Bangladesh thriller by Ananyo Mamun
Starring Shakib Khan,Mahiya Mahi,Orchita Sporshia

On 25 December 2020, film director Anonno Mamun and actor Shaheen Mridha have been charged with making a film with pornographic content . Dhaka Metropolitan Police arrested the artists the day before due to a case filed against them under the Pornography Control Act for allegedly insulting the police in the film Nabab LLB .

The film Nabab LLB was released on 16 December 2020 and is set in a fictional courtroom, treating about rape and the treatment of victims.

According to Al Jazeera , the report released by Dhaka Metropolitan Police points to making and acting in a film containing such offensive and obscene dialogue as a reason for the artists' arrest. The report also highlights that the police was poorly represented in the film and that the representation of the police officer using offensive gestures and obscene language during the fictional interrogation in the film could cause negative perceptions about policing among public.

There is a petition calling on the Dhaka Metropolitan Police to drop all charges against Anonno Mamun and Shaheen Mridha has been circulated online. Sign the petition here .

Suffer Little Children is a 1983 UK video horror by Alan Briggs.
Starring Colin Chamberlain, Ginny Rose and Jon Hollanz.

The film was cut for an unofficial BBFC 18 rating issued prior to the implementation of the VRA. The film was seized by the police anyway and the film got caught up in the tabloid hysteria around the video nasty era. The film was passed 18 uncut for UK DVD release in 2017.

The DVD version has a significant number of variations from the VHS. version.

See Gav Crimson's detailed history of the censorship of Suffer Little Children and the timeline of newspaper coverage .

Summary Notes

This amateur video production, (not particularly well regarded), is claimed to be a reconstruction of events involving child demonic possession which took place at 45 Kingston Road, New Malden, Surrey, England in August 1984. None of these events were reported to the press though, not the to mention the fact that the film was conceived and shot in 1983, well before the supposed baseline event.

The video was submitted to the BBFC for a pre-VRA unofficial rating in December 1984. The BBFC asked for about 2 minutes of cuts. However the distributors suffered a police raid on the day after the submission and the police seized the film. The police seemed to think that the uncut version was illegal and would not give the distributors the opportunity to implement the cuts that would make it legal. The DPP considered the film for 3 months before deciding that no further action would be taken as long as the film was only distributed in the BBFC approved version. The film was caught up in press frenzy at this time, with the inevitable calls for a ban and worse.

Horror Channel ushers in New Year with monstrous Saturday night premieres.

Horror Channel gets the New Year off to a horrifying start with three thrilling primetime Saturday night channel premieres, including John Schlesinger's gripping psychological thriller Pacific Heights , starring Melanie Griffith, Matthew Modine and Michael Keaton. Plus, there's Clive Barker's dark monster fantasy Nightbreed , starring David Cronenberg, and Anthony DiBlasi's claustrophobic, intensely creepy Last Shift.

Other highlights for January include Bernard Rose's Frankenstein , a stylishly smart update of the classic myth, starring Xavier Samuel, Danny Huston, Carrie-Anne Moss and Tony Todd, Scott Stewart's compulsive alien home-invasion thriller Dark Skies , Serenity , the big screen continuation of Joss Whedon's 2002 television series Firefly, Christopher Smith's Black Death , a brooding, bloody plague-ridden action horror, starring Eddie Redmayne, Leigh Janiak's acclaimed Honeymoon starring Harry Treadaway and Rose Leslie and Caroline Labreche & Steeve Leonard's unusual and compelling sci-fi thriller Radius .

Wicked City is a 1987 Japan anime horror sci-fi by Yoshiaki Kawajiri.
With Gregory Snegoff, Mike Reynolds and Alexandra Kenworthy.

There has been peace between the worlds of the mortals and the supernatural for centuries, but the balance is now being threatened. The Radical elements from the Supernatural world are crossing over into the mortal universe for the purpose of destroying the peace forever!

The film was cut by the BBFC for 18 rated VHS in 1993 and cinema release in 1994. The 1993 BBFC cuts were:

• A panning shot of Jin having his hand on Maki's crotch is deleted
• Close-up of Maki's crotch with Jin's hand on it, along with the subsequent shot of Maki's hair grabbing Jin, which is cut for continuity.
• The demon creature forcing its tongue to Maki's mouth, and then doing the "old in-out".
• The beginning of Maki's rape by the demons is short of a demon mauling on her breast, and the following brief rape shot.
• The rest of Maki's rape is massively reduced and cut (over 20 seconds). This includes the demons mauling and her raping her.
• Raping of Maki in the demon base has lost four close-ups - the demons squeezing her breasts, Maki getting raped from behind, a close of Maki's face, and of her chained hands.

The films has been re-released in 2020 as a double bill with Demon City Shinjuku and has been released uncut on DVD and Blu-ray. Anthony commented:

I can confirm, judging by the existing descriptions of what the BBFC cut, that this brand-new 2020 DVD and Blu-Ray release of Wicked City is uncut.

The running time stacks up with the uncut version too.

UK: BBFC details not yet published though for:

• 2020 Manga Limited Edition [Wicked City and Demon City Shinjuku] (RB) Blu-ray at UK Amazon #ad
• 2020 Manga Standard Edition [Wicked City and Demon City Shinjuku] (RB) Blu-ray at UK Amazon
• 2020 Manga [Wicked City and Demon City Shinjuku] R2 DVD at UK Amazon