Bad Cinema

Bad Cinema.

The film 'Kids' by Larry Clark was viewed for our, so called 'bad cinema'. Kids is a film that I have seen before when I was a young teen. It was being shown on television, and after watching the start whilst flicking through the channels in the early hours, I was hooked and ended up watching the entire film. It was something which stayed with me for a few weeks and kept cropping back up in my mind. I don't think however that it was because of the under age sex, or the violence, or for any of the reasons that the hype around the film exists, it was the irony that did it for me. Not only is the girl who has only had sex once the one who ends up contracting HIV, but she ends up being just minutes too late to save an even younger girl from the same fate, and it's all due to Telly, a character who is so easy to hate! Not only because of his character but because the actor (Leo Fitzpatrick) just had one of those faces you would love to slap.

After learning of all the controversy surrounding the film and watching it again, I honestly can't see what all the fuss is about. It is what being a teen is like and the people I sat with at the cinema agreed. Perhaps it's just the fact that this faced up to the reality of what actually goes on for the first time in cinema.

When thinking of films that 'Kids' reminded me of, I thought of 'Bully' and was surprised to discover that this was also a 'Larry Clark' film. Other titles that are similar to kids that I have watched are 'Kidulthood' and 'Adulthood' by Noel Clarke (maybe it's a Clark(e) thing!) which address real issues faced by teens.

Interview with Larry Clark; http://www.harmony-korine.com/paper/int/lc/commotion.html