News

Alan Clarke’s brutally unflinching prison drama Scum is set to make its long-awaited return to digital platforms in the UK and Ireland, with Vertigo Releasing confirming a release date of 17th March. The controversial 1979 film, which remains one of the most hard-hitting portrayals of the British borstal system, stars Ray Winstone in a breakthrough performance that would cement his status as one of the country’s most formidable actors.

Originally produced as a BBC television play in 1977, Scum was banned before its intended broadcast, deemed too extreme for public consumption. Clarke and screenwriter Roy Minton refused to let their vision disappear into obscurity, reworking the film as a theatrical release in 1979. What followed was a harrowing portrayal of institutional brutality that quickly became one of the most infamous British films of its era.

Set in a juvenile correctional facility, Scum follows Carlin (Winstone), a young offender who quickly learns...

Alan Clarke‘s little-seen prison drama Scum has already been available on Blu-ray via Kino Lorber for a few years now, but they’ll finally be giving the 2K restoration a theatrical run later this year, and with this news comes a inventive new trailer. Playing with the film’s Banned label, the trailer features only stills from Scum — some tantalizing or provocative — and reviews from critics, read aloud by the hard-bit narrator.

Starring a young and spry Ray Winstone, Scum tells the story of life in a brutal British prison, where there’s no easy way out. While it seemingly had clause for a ban in the 70’s, what is perhaps most interesting is if it still contains shock value in today’s climate. See the trailer below, with a nod to Blu-ray.com.

A landmark expose of Britain’s violent reform schools, Alan Clarke’s Scum is a controversial shock to the system.

The Weinstein Company Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher in “The Iron Lady”

Biopics often spur political controversy, but the coming film “The Iron Lady,” in which Meryl Streep stars as British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, is unusual because it’s drawing fire from both the left and the right.

Friends and supporters of Thatcher decry the depiction of the former Prime Minister, in some scenes, as an infirm elderly lady plagued by the effects of Alzheimer’s. It was disclosed...

Female Force: Ayn Rand has been unveiled by Bluewater Productions. Written by John Blundell and drawn by Todd Tennant, the 32-page one-shot gives a biographic account of the late Russian-American author's life. "When the American economy went into a nose dive recently what did we all turn to? Did we dig out battered old 'Econ 101' textbooks? Did we turn to the writings of some aged Ivy League professor? No," said Blundell. "Instead we dusted off or repurchased The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, those great classic American novels by Russian immigrant Ayn Rand which deal so (more)...

Former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher and current First Lady of France Carla Bruni-Sarkozy are to get their own comic books.

They will feature in the Female Force line of biographical comics published by Bluewater Productions.

Female Force: Margaret Thatcher hits stores this July and Female Force: Carla Bruni-Sarkozy in August. You can get a sneak peek at the cover artwork of both titles below.

Written by Thatcher's longtime friend, John Blundell, the Margaret Thatcher comic will trace her rise to prominence in British politics and her historic decade-plus as the UK's prime minister.

Blundell, author of the book Margaret Thatcher: A Portrait of the Iron Lady, explored not only Thatcher's rise in his book, but also her deep respect and admiration of the United States, something that he included in the Female Force version of Thatcher's story.

"It was often noted that every time she set foot on Us soil,...

Bluewater Productions is to release biography comics based on the lives of Margaret Thatcher and Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. The former British prime minister and the current first lady of France will be the subject of future books in the publisher's Female Force line. Illustrated by Robert Bruner, the Thatcher comic will be written by her longtime friend John Blundell, author of the book Margaret Thatcher: A Portrait Of The Iron Lady. It will focus on her rise to power and her relationship with the Us. "There is a tremendous amount of interest in Lady Thatcher in the United (more)...

44 Inch Chest stars Deadwood's Ian McShane alongside a who's-who of British beefcake, but who would make John Patterson's dream team of UK movie hard men?

I have to admit I like the look of 44 Inch Chest, and particularly its wall-to-wall cast of British hard men: Ray Winstone, Ian McShane, Steven Berkoff and John Hurt.

John Hurt, you say, a British tough guy? Well, it's all about stunt-casting here; almost every major piece of casting works because somewhere in each actor's back catalogue is at least one meaty outing as a nasty piece of work brandishing a gun. For Hurt it was Stephen Frears's mid-80s Spanish revenger's road-movie The Hit.

Ian McShane is actually a two-stage piece of stunt casting. When he was cast as the ambi-sexual crime lord in Sexy Beast, the film-makers were referencing his role as Richard Burton's gangland catamite in Villain (1971), and...