Scum

this movie was made after the B.B.C. had problems with the original TV version,which to my mind was just as brutal.you can't help but root for Carlin as he gets his revenge,the greenhouse scene has to be up there with the likes of certain scenes from 'cannibal holocaust' and 'last house on the left'.Truly harrowing and unforgettable.Ray Winstone is one of my all time favourite actors,as is Phil Daniels.This film stands as a tribute to Alan Clarke (Made In Britain is also another classic).This movie remains as one of the grittiest movies I have ever seen.I saw it for the first time when I was about ten years of age,on a pre-certificate VHS copy round at my dad's mate's house one Saturday night.The film has stayed with me ever since,and now I own my own copy of the film,I hope to show it to my son when he is older(I hope he appreciates it!!!)

Carlin (Ray Winstone of "Nil by mouth" and "Sexy Beast") is a young criminal who after assaulting a police officer gets sent to a borstal (juvinial prison), with two other youth offenders, where they find life inside hell with the authoritarian system brutal and the criminal inmate hierarchy equally, if not more so. They must find a way to survive. Carlin is able to climb the hierarchy, the other two are not really that 'lucky' This TV movie was shelved by the BBC1 for 14 years before before being shown on Channel 4 exactly once, and then only in honor of a deceased Alan Clarke. Gritty, and depressing if a slight bit overly sensationalized. Still it's interesting to watch even if the feature film version IS better. In response to the shelving of the film Clarke and writer Minton remade it as a theatrical film in two years later in 1979. This movie can be found in Blue Undergrounds Alan Clarke Collection.

My Grade: B-

DVD Extras: Commetary with actors Phil Daniels & David Threlfall, and Producer Margaret Matheson; 2 Selected scenes commentary by Ray Winstone (one of which wasn't in the film)

Scum is a fabulously gritty borstal drama revolving around troublemaker Carlin (Winstone) and his campaign to do his time quietly. The menacing staff and inmates of the Borstal (young offenders prison) are frighteningly realistic and the whole film has the feel of a fly-on-the-wall documentary. Sporadic violence comes with no warning and the rape scene in the greenhouse is one of the most harrowing I have seen on film (may be cut in some versions). Full marks to Alan Clarke and Ray Minton for this beauty.

Scum (1977) was originally produced as part of the BBC's Play for Today series, but the result, shot in a gritty docu-drama style, was considered too harrowing for broadcast and was effectively banned. Two years later, director Alan Clarke remade his play as a film, which became one of the most talked about movies in British school playgrounds during the early 80s thanks to its unrelenting violence, racist language, and a particularly notorious rape scene.

So, how do the two versions compare? Well, barring one or two minor scenes, the original TV play and the 1979 film are almost identical to each other in terms of basic content and structure, with much of the same dialogue, many of the same cast members, and Clarke using the same set-ups and angles for his shots. However, the two versions do differ from each other in terms of performances: although the cast are more than adequate in the TV version, the play feels a bit like a dress rehearsal when compared with the movie, the cast seemingly still working out how best to tackle their roles. Two years down the line, and everybody absolutely nails it, but here there are one or two performances that fall a little flat.

That said, the play is still a fine piece of work, a powerful and highly controversial drama—one that, to this day, I find it hard to believe the BBC even contemplated showing in 1977.

I'll try not to comment on the controversy of this television drama . Everyone knows it was banned by the BBC prior to being shown on its PLAY FOR TODAY slot in 1977 and it wasn't until the early 1990s that the BBC relented by showing it with little fanfare .

Over all I thought the film version was better . Structure wise Roy Minton's script is more or less the same as the movie version with one added strand here where Carling is allowed to have a " wife " , in reality one of the younger prisoners , as a perk for being a daddy , a story strand that doesn't really work in my opinion . Director Alan Clarke would later re-employ nearly the entire cast for the movie version with the exception of Archer , and I couldn't thinking while watching the movie that Archer was written as a type of hippy . Here David Throfall plays Archer as .... A hippy . I don't want to criticise Mick Ford's performance in the movie but here we see the role played as it was written and is the superior version , but this is the only aspect where the original teleplay out scores the movie

I think because the movie version can get away with so much more than a television drama ( At least one made in the 1970s ) this version isn't so gritty and compelling . The film includes extreme language in every scene which adds to the realism and as has been mentioned the infamous rape scene isn't as shocking and depressing as the one in the movie version so compared to the 1979 cinema release the original television drama might be something of a disappointment leading the viewer to ask what was the controversy about in the first place ?