Sunday, April 01, 2007

Punishing Joffe And Cohen

Why do people want to punish Roland Joffe and Larry Cohen - not to mention the many other folk who put in months of hard work to make Captivity? Why can't they see that only the distribitor, After Dark, is at fault, and only they need to be 'handled'.

Denying the film a rating is simply the wrong thing to do. Fining the distributor - as heavily as they want - makes a lot more sense.

Joss Whedon is supporting the 'Remove the Rating' campaign. How would he feel if Serenity had been denied a rating because of some dumb idiots marketing it in a grossly inappropriate way? He'd be punished by such a sanction as much as the distributor - providing, of course, he really wants people to see his films. If that's the real reason he makes them. I mean... what other commendable reason is there?

[EDIT: Please read the comments, and contribute - no matter what side of the argument you are on]

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I just found an image of the billboards, and it is not as shocking as I thought. I've seen other images in society that in my opinion would be much more damaging to children. I agree that screwing the film makers for what is probably a very bad movie is over blowing things by a lot.
To me this just barely crosses the line and reminds people with traumatic memories of bad events. Scale back the campaign and use it as an example of where that line is. It has been established.

Brendon said...

We posted the billboards here a week or two ago, when all the fuss was at full steam.

I expect Cohen's original script was probably a pretty good B-script. His work normally is.

Lord alone knows what Joffe and the producers have made of it. We already commented here on how they altered the end for no reason.

Anonymous said...

I really don't understand the basis for the argument. While it's a shame a director's film might be sacrificed in this, it comes down to a bad business decision by the people who purchased the film in the first place. It's great to have sympathy, but c'mon. They were told not to release this advertising campaign into the public marketplace and they did in the face of that. That's what happens and should happen.

Brendon said...

It's a shame? A shame?

Surely the film is the point of this whole shooting match. So many arguments hinge on this being a business - which it is - but neglect that it is also an art, or at least a craft.

A film shouldn't be sacrificed to punish a business. That's like limiting a publisher to a print run of 100 copies on a hotly anticipated title - seems like suitable punishment for the publisher, but it really, really screws the author.

Why not just fine the publisher? I don't care, personally, how much you fine them - just don't take it out on the artists and craftspeople who have worked hard.