Deep in the vaults of the Australian National Archives lie thousands upon thousands of celluloid scraps: scenes that were cut by government censors from films imported into the country between the years of 1958-1971. Peppered through this collection are banned scenes from some of the most influential directors in history, including Godard, Polanski, Bergman, Varda, and Fellini. But censorship extended to hundreds of forgotten films—from avant-garde and documentary films to Hollywood B-movies.
When Sari Braithwaite gained unprecedented access to this mysterious collection, she thought she could create a work to liberate this censored archive, to honor these displaced frames, and condemn censorship. But after years of bearing witness to these fragments of film, this archive became challenging and unnerving. It felt almost impossible to celebrate or reconcile.
[CENSORED] is a work stitched entirely from these never-before-seen artifacts of censorship: it is the story of how one filmmaker confronted an archive to reckon with film, censorship, and the power of the gaze.
Preceded by:
Release
Bill Morrison, US, 2010, 13 min., b&w
