Scum (film)

Scum
Theatrical release poster
Directed byAlan Clarke
Written byRoy Minton
Produced by
Starring
CinematographyPhil Meheux
Edited byMichael Bradsell
Production
companies
Kendon Films
Berwick Street Films "A"
Distributed byGTO
Release dates
Running time
97 minutes[1]
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish
Budget£250,000[2]

Scum is a 1979 British prison drama film directed by Alan Clarke and starring Ray Winstone, Mick Ford, Julian Firth and John Blundell. The film portrays the brutality of life inside a British borstal. The script was originally filmed as a television play for the BBC's Play for Today series in 1977. However, owing to the violence depicted, it was withdrawn from broadcast.[3] Two years later, director Alan Clarke and scriptwriter Roy Minton remade it as a film, first shown on Channel 4 in 1983.[3] By this time the borstal system had been reformed. The original TV version was eventually allowed to be aired eight years later in 1991.

The film tells the story of a young offender named Carlin as he arrives at the institution and his rise through violence and self-protection to the top of the inmates' pecking order, purely as a tool to survive. Beyond Carlin's individual storyline, the film also serves as an indictment of the borstal system's flaws, with no attempt at rehabilitation. The warders and convicts alike are brutalised by the system. The film's controversy arose over its graphic depiction of racism, extreme violence, rape, suicide, many fights and very strong language.[4]

  1. ^ "Scum (X)". 4 June 1979. Retrieved 10 March 2018.
  2. ^ Alexander Walker, National Heroes: British Cinema in the Seventies and Eighties, Harrap, 1985 p 155
  3. ^ a b "Scum". BBC Radio 4. 2009. Retrieved 15 March 2019.
  4. ^ "Scum (1979) – Film Review". Film4. Archived from the original on 12 March 2014.