An explicit French film featuring graphic scenes of sex and violence is set to go on show at cinemas in Britain. The film, called Baise-moi ( Screw Me ), caused huge controversy when it was screened in France because of its close-up sex shots.
British distributors are in talks with the French producers of the film and hope to bring it to cinemas here soon. The English version is entitled Rape Me, but is no different from the one that drew more than 30,000 filmgoers in its first week after release - with a '16' certificate - in France in June. It offers 90 minutes of almost non-stop hardcore sex and violence.
The film was shot in northern France and follows the fortunes of two bored young suburban women who set out on a spree of sex and murder after one of them is brutally raped and then shoots dead her brother in a row.
A passer-by is shot for her cashpoint card, a tramp who leers at the two women is gunned down and two gendarmes who stop them for a check on papers are summarily executed. A man is picked up for sex and then stamped to death with high-heels, another dies during a shoot-out in a sex club when he is forced to strip and pretend to be a pig before being shot in the anus. There are graphic sequences of fellatio and intercourse.
In France last week a campaign group linked to the far Right forced cinemas to withdraw the film temporarily, but it is to be re-released with an '18' certificate.
Optimum Releasing, a London-based independent distributor, last week said it had been speaking to Canal Plus - the French entertainment giant that is marketing the film - and hoped to show it in British cinemas.
'Films like this can perform an important function,' said Will Clarke, Optimum's managing director. 'We are interested in quality movies. The controversial angle is of interest but it has to be decent artistically.' Two other film companies have confirmed their interest to The Observer .
The production team of Baise-moi, which was made for under £1 million, claims the film is not deliberately controversial or titillating but makes important points about sexual violence, prostitution and friendship.
'Anyone who goes to see it for a thrill will be disappointed,' said Coralie Trinh Thi, co-director and ex-porn star. Many critics have praised the film's examination of the 'moral nihilism' of modern life. The liberal establishment is behind Trinh Thi and her co-director and writer Virginie Despentes, with politicians calling the pornography laws 'obsolete'.
British companies hope shifts in the UK in attitudes to screen sex may help get Baise-moi shown in cinemas. Last year Romance, a French production, was passed almost uncut but for a one-second excision of an ejaculating penis, and three years ago David Cronenberg's Crash, about people aroused by road accidents, was given an '18' certificate.
A High Court judgment, which this year allowed seven 'hardcore' sex films, with titles such as Horny Catbabe and Nympho Nurse Nancy, to be sold on video in licensed sex shops, will be incorporated into new guidelines for the British Board of Film Classification.
Baise-moi will face resistance in Britain. 'You cannot possibly allow a film like this,' said John Beyer of the National Viewers and Listeners Association. 'We have a rising number of sexual crimes and if you constantly put up lifestyles and roles glamourising what is harming our society then it is just going to make things worse.'
Vincent Maraval, in charge of marketing the film for Canal Plus, said it had been sold to 30 countries, including Spain, Italy, Japan and South Korea. Judges at the Locarno Film Festival have selected the film for the competition next month.
