This screening replaces the Sunday 5/5 event in Winooski which due to unforeseen circumstances did not take place. Free with suggested donation of $5 at the door.
Presented by VTIFF and Waking Windows
Directed by Franco Rosso
UK | 1980 w/2019 restoration | Fiction | English & Jamaican patois w/English subtitles | 95 mins
Never before released in the US!
Although made in 1980 in Britain, it is extraordinary how it resonates in 2019 USA. An incendiary portrait of racial tension and police brutality set in South London, the late Franco Rosso’s Babylon has never been released in the United States—until now. Rated X in the U.K., it world-premiered at Cannes’ Semaine de la critique in 1980 and went to Toronto (then known as the Festival of Festivals) for its North American premiere, but was passed on by the New York Film Festival. The Time Out headline from the film’s cover story upon its British release in November 1980 read, “The movie the New York Film Festival found too hot to handle.” Punk doyenne Vivien Goldman, who wrote the piece, cited the reasons: “being too
controversial, and likely to incite racial tension.”
Babylon follows a young reggae DJ (Brinsley Forde, M.B.E., frontman of the British group 1 Aswad) of the Ital
Lion sound system2 in Thatcher-era South London as he pursues his musical ambitions while also battling fiercely
against the racism and xenophobia of employers, neighbors, police, and the National Front. Written by Martin
Stellman ( Quadrophenia ) and shot by two-time Oscar-winner Chris Menges ( The Killing Fields ), with beautiful,
smoky cinematography that’s been compared to Taxi Driver, Babylon is fearless and unsentimental, yet tempered
by the hazy bliss of the dance hall and set to a blistering reggae, dub, and lovers rock soundtrack featuring Aswad,
Johnny Clarke, Yabby You, Cassandra, I-Roy, and Michael Prophet. The film, anchored by legendary dub
innovator and reggae and punk producer Dennis Bovell’s propulsive score, is also partly based on Bovell’s false
imprisonment for running a sound system, Sufferer’s Hi Fi, in the mid-70s.
Featuring:
[one_half]Blue [a.k.a. Dave] Brinsley Forde, M.B.E.
Ronnie Karl Howman
Beefy Trevor Laird
Dreadhead Archie Pool
Scientist [a.k.a. Spark] Brian Bovell
Errol David N. Haynes
Lover Victor Romero Evans
Elaine Beverly Michaels
Mum Cynthia Powell
Wesley [Mum’s live-in boyfriend] T. Bone Wilson
Alan Mel Smith
Rastaman Cosmo Laidlaw
Fat Larry Stefan Kalipha
[/one_half] [one_half_last]
Carlton Mark Monero
Sandra Beverley Dublin
Sandra’s Father Granville Garner
The Fence Anthony Trent
William Donovan Platt
Woman at lock-up Maggie Steed
Man on balcony Bill Moody
Sir Watts David “Negotiator” Cunningham
Compere King Sounds
Wolf [of Shaka Sound] Malcolm Frederick
Spooky [of Shaka Sound] Patrick Worrall
Jah Shaka as Himself [/one_half_last]