Uncut (film)
| Uncut | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | John Greyson |
| Written by | John Greyson |
| Produced by | John Greyson |
| Starring | Michael Achtman Matthew Ferguson Damon D'Oliveira |
| Cinematography | Kim Derko |
| Edited by | Dennis Day |
| Music by | Andrew Zealley |
| Distributed by | Millivres |
Release date |
|
Running time | 92 mins |
| Country | Canada |
| Language | English |
Uncut is a 1997 Canadian docudrama film written and directed by John Greyson.[1]
Set in Ottawa in 1979, the film stars Matthew Ferguson as Peter Cort, a researcher writing a book on male circumcision, and Michael Achtman as Peter Koosens, his assistant who has a sexual obsession with Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and regularly doctors photographs to depict himself and Trudeau in romantic entanglements.[2]
They later meet Peter Denham (Damon D'Oliveira), a video artist who sets his films to Jackson Five songs. After Denham inserts photographs of Koosens and Trudeau into one of his videos, the three are arrested for copyright violation by an opera-singing police officer, put on trial in a courtroom scene set to La Habanera, and sent to a prison boot camp.
The film is also intercut with documentary footage of artists such as John Oswald, A. A. Bronson, Linda Griffiths and Thomas Waugh discussing censorship, as well as Trudeau himself invoking martial law during the 1970 October Crisis.[2]
The film was inspired in part by the then emerging debate about outing closeted LGBT people, while the copyright themes were inspired by Greyson's battle with the estate of Kurt Weill over the use of parody versions of Weill songs in his early short film The Making of Monsters.[3]
Cast
- Michael Achtman ... Peter Koosens
- Matthew Ferguson ... Peter Cort
- Damon D'Oliveira ... Peter Denham
- Maria Reidstra ... Officer
- Alexandra Webb ... Defense Lawyer
- Helene Ducharme ... Judge
- Daniel MacIvor ... Newscaster
- David Roche ... Joe Typist
- Shaftiq Ettienne ... Fred Typist
References
- ^ "Uncut takes provocative look at gossip and libel: Director Greyson uses Pierre Trudeau, Michael Jackson and circumcision to address tabloid culture". Montreal Gazette, June 27, 1998.
- ^ a b "Greyson cuts through culture of sampling". Toronto Star, July 3, 1998.
- ^ "John Greyson, an Uncut above". The Globe and Mail, May 30, 1997.