Toronto. Obscene.

The subject of Obscene is Grove Press and Evergreen Review founder Barney Rosset, who "continually faced courtrooms and politicians who were offended and/or threatened by things that are embarrassingly tame and bland compared to what we've got nowadays," writes Christopher Campbell at Cinematical. "Rosset was the one who fought to get books like Lady Chatterley's Lover, Tropic of Cancer, Naked Lunch, The Autobiography of Malcolm X and others onto American bookshelves and later to get films like I Am Curious (Yellow) into American theaters.... Unlike their subject, the makers of Obscene seem far from broke, as the film is possibly the most over-produced documentary since Inside Deep Throat."

"You may not know Barney Rosset but the world we live in would be radically different without him," writes Todd Brown at Twitch. "Rosset is a fascinating subject, still possessed of a remarkably nimble mind well into his 80s, and gives refreshingly frank interviews. Better yet, he's also a bit of a pack rat and has maintained a sizeable archive of family movies, radio interviews, television appearances and the like, all of which have been made available to the filmmakers."

"Visually, however, the film never treads into the territory of he innovation and modernism that embody Rosset's life's work, instead limiting the story to an orthodox, chronological summary of what happened," adds Tom Hall. "I liked this movie a lot, especially because I believe so strongly in Rosset's principled stance that adults should be able to make up heir own minds about what books they read and images they care to take in... but I felt it could use an extra 'oomph' that more concern about the visual strategy (and the better integration of some of the film's talking heads in to the movie's storyline) might have delivered."

ST VanAirsdale - you know, the Reeler - talks with directors Neil Ortenberg and Daniel O'Connor, "themselves veteran New York publishers whose close alliance with Rosset (not to mention chats with the likes of Gore Vidal, John Waters, Jim Carroll and others) offer unprecedented access to the 85-year-old's archives and reflections on life, love, business and the perils of publishing the word 'cunt.'"

Posted by dwhudson at September 21, 2007 10:07 AM