American film banned from festival down under

The Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) has refused a request for a "festival exemption" that would have permitted Tony Comstock's explicit film DAMON AND HUNTER to be screened at the annual Queer Screen queerDOC film festival.

The OFLC assigned the film an X rating, preventing it from being shown anywhere except at an adult theater. In the past, film festivals have been granted permission to run X-rated films.

Tony's open letter about the OFLC's decision is an eye-opener. He describes how he tried to cut the film into something the OFLC could approve, and why he ultimately could not.

...in the past weeks I have spent many hours and thousands of dollars in an attempt to re-cut the film in accordance with the OFLC’s instructions. But in the end I could not reconcile my reasons for making this film with the demands made by the OFLC.

I made this film because I believe depictions of truly joyous and wholesome sex, depictions that represent the overwhelmingly positive and important role that our sexuality plays in our humanity, are all but absent from the cinematic landscape. Moreover, in an age where it is easier than ever to see sexually explicit imagery, it is harder than ever to find imagery that reflects the common reality of sex: that sex is nice; that sex is normal; that sex is good. I made this film because even today, here in America, in Australia, and elsewhere, the state’s role in the most intimate aspects of the lives of its citizens remains an open question.

He shows why the OFLC's denial of the festival exemption hurts Australia as a whole, not just those folks who have already purchased tickets:

...their refusal to grant a festival exemption to for the queerDOC screening is heavy-handed, serves no legitimate purpose in maintaining civil order, and is wildly disconnected with the wishes of the vast majority of Australian people.

And he makes an excellent point about the priorities involved:

I have been a photographer my entire adult life. In the name of bearing witness to the human condition I’ve documented unspeakable suffering, violence, and death; and for that I’ve been praised as a courageous witness. When I review the scope of people, places and events that have passed before my lens, I am unable to comprehend the censor’s rational for “protecting” adults from photographic images of sexuality. Adults have the capacity and the right to choose for themselves what sort of images they wish to see. They do not need to be protected from images of sex, and least of all from a film like DAMON AND HUNTER. In the face of horrific images we are exposed to each and every day, the OFLC decision is not only unfair, it is perverse.

DAMON AND HUNTER is a film about the joy love and sex brings into our lives. DAMON AND HUNTER is about our manifest right as adults to experience that joy, regardless of whom or how we love. DAMON AND HUNTER is about the dignity we find when we are true to ourselves in the face of adversity and oppression. DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT TOGETHER is a film about what’s best in all of us.

I don't know if there's anything we can do – sign a petition? write another letter? Buy up all the DVDs and mail them secretly to Australians? – but I sincerely hope that people sit up and take notice. As Tony says:

...it is harder than ever to find imagery that reflects the common reality of sex: that sex is nice; that sex is normal; that sex is good. I made this film because even today, here in America, in Australia, and elsewhere, the state’s role in the most intimate aspects of the lives of its citizens remains an open question.