Even to a specialist, the Australian laws governing how our films are classified and where films can and cannot be shown and sold are confusing and arcane. This is further compounded by the fact that the law seems to be enforced when it serves the public relations interest of the local authorities.

While it’s not illegal to own or view X-rated material in one’s own home, it is illegal to sell DVDs of X-rated films anywhere but in Canberra and and the Northern Territory, which means that shops that make our films available to people in Queensland, or Victoria, or anywhere else are participating in a quiet act of civil disobedience; and while raids are rare, they do happen.

With that in mind, we’d like to take a moment to thank our Australian retailers. If you’re in Australia, and wondering whether or not DAMON AND HUNTER is worth all this fuss (or our other films), we encourage you to visit any of the below retailers. Some of them even offer our films for rent. For a few dollars you can watch DAMON AND HUNTER for yourself and make up your own mind.

When you go, please do tell them Tony sent you; and please do tell them he says thank you!

It has been a tumultuous and stressful couple of of weeks here at Comstock Films. The thrill we felt at the prospect of DAMON AND HUNTER playing in front of a large audience in a real movie house has given way to (at various times) doubt, despair, and anger; sometimes all three at once. In the upset of it all, I sort of lost sight of why I make these films.

I make these films, 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.

The day after the sold out Melbourne screenings, when QueerScreen got in touch with us and asked if they could screen DAMON AND HUNTER at their upcoming queerDOC festival, we were thrilled and honored by their interest in the film. The success in Melbourne hinted at it, and the invitation to QueerDOC seemed to confirm that I had finally created a film that transcended its explicit sexual content without giving up its erotic power in the bargain, a film that people could be proud to fight for in the face of the repressive laws and regressive attitudes that can make it so hard to make these films.

When QueerScreen asked to show DAMON AND HUNTER, they knew what kind of film it was, and exactly what the rules were regarding screening an X-rated film in Australia. If they had any hesitation about screening the film in it’s entirety, that should have been addressed at the time. That could have given me the time to consider if and how I might alter DAMON AND HUNTER so that it could be screened legally.

Instead, Comstock Films has, under the pressure of eleventh hour circumstances, been made to be the advocate for this screening on QueerDOC’s behalf. Through each stage of this tumult, salaried bureaucrats have offered vague and conflicting advice on how the film might be altered to gain OFLC approval. Each iteration of changes costs Comstock Films in time, money, and aggravation.

What have we got for our trouble? Yesterday the OFLC told us that the stink we’ve raised over DAMON AND HUNTER will be a factor in our future dealing with them. “Tread lightly” was their advice as to how I speak about any re-cut of my film. The intimation, and intimidation is clear: for daring to question their application of the law in this case Comstock films will receive unwelcome special attention in our future submissions.

Ten years ago, when I started making these films, it was with the idea that I was going to make films about sex that I wanted to make, films that I wanted to see; not the films I thought would sell, and certainly not the films I thought would get by the censors.

DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT TOGETHER represents ten years of risk, sacrifice, and uncompromising work to achieve that vision. The organizers of the Melbourne Underground Film Festival felt that the film was worth putting themselves at risk to show their audience. The DVD is available at retailers throughout Australia who believe it is worth defying the law to make this film available to customers, including retailers that stock no other X-rated DVDs. Between M.U.F.F. and QueerDOC programers,more than 30 years of festival programing experience says that DAMON AND HUNTER is a film that deserves to be seen – in a theater, by an audience.

We’ve already done all we can do in an attempt to produce a version of DAMON AND HUNTER that QueerDOC feels it can screen, and in so doing, we’ve cut the very heart out of this film. DAMON AND HUNTER is a film about sex, and about the simple truth that sex is one of the most beautiful and important things that two people can do together. It’s too much. We’ve worked to hard for too long to make these films the way they need to be made, to now bend over backwards, and spend time and money we don’t have, all for the chance to show an eviserated version of our film to a few hundred people in Sydney.

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 find myself unable to understand the censor’s rational for “protecting” adults from photographic images of sexuality. But allowing that I could be wrong about that, certainly adults don’t need to be protected from a film like DAMON AND HUNTER . DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT TOGETHER is a film about what’s best in all of us.

DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT TOGETHER is a film about sex. It’s a film made to be seen by grownups who want to see it. It has sex in it – lots of it. Whether or not DAMON AND HUNTER seen at QueerDOC is up to them.

CensorsClassifiers at the Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification have reviewed DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT FOR THE OFLC online, and although they not issued an official ruling, they have said that the objectionable sexual content has been removed to their satisfaction.

But they have also expressed concern that the replacement of the objectionable footage text reading Footage Removed by Order of the Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification is “defamatory to the OFLC.”

The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines “defame” in the following ways:

1 archaic : DISGRACE
2 : to harm the reputation of by libel or slander
3 archaic : ACCUSE

The position of the OFLC is that they have not ordered the removal of the objectionable sexual material from DAMOM AND HUNTER: DOING IT TOGETHER, they are merely enforcing the law; that we have not been compelled by the OFLC to remove the footage, but have done so voluntarily.

Right.

This “concern” about defaming the OFLC seems disingenuous on their part. The law they say they’re “merely enforcing” clearly gives them the discretion to give DAMON AND HUNTER an R-rating, or to allow an exemption for a film festival screening, or both.

The OFLC both interprets and enforces the law. The OFLC can, if they choose, strip a film festival of it’s right to operate. The OFLC can also exert more subtle, insidious pressure. For example, they can tighten the exemptions they give for films from outside of Australian that a festival wishes to show. That’s right, all foreign films shown at Australian Festivals must be give a waiver by the OFLC before they can be shown.

Certainly in making this stink, Comstock Films has lost all hope of any of our future films being given anything other than an X-rating, but the OFLC also has the option of “Refused Classification” on our future submissions – which is nothing less than a total ban on distributing them in any form in any part of Australia.

Of course I am frustrated at not being able to show my film, the way I intended it to be seen to a group of adults who want to see it. I contemplated taping a brief “Director’s Statement” that could be shown immediately ahead of DAMON AND HUNTER to explain to the audience how and why the film had been altered, but putting that statement on the screen in a theater puts it under the jurisdiction of the OFLC; the Director’s Statement would need a waiver to be shown, and I can’t image the OFLC wouldn’t have “concerns” that my statement was “defamatory to the OFLC.” This is beginning to feel like a fight I can’t win.

On top of all of that, from the start I have been concerned with how raising a ruckus might effect our dealings with the OFLC on future films. We don’t make money showing films at film festivals, we make money by selling DVDs, and we can’t do that without submitting our films to the OFLC for “classification”. Moreover, the OFLC’s X-rating already means it’s illegal to sell DAMON AND HUNTER in most of Australia. What if they decide to give our DVD sales the same special attention they’ve given the QueerDOC screening?

I am weary. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since this mess started. I’ve got a beautiful film MATT AND KHYM that needs to be finished. The Summer is winding down and it won’t be long before it’s too cold to swim and sail with my girls. Maybe enough’s enough. It’s not my country, and It’s not my fight. Maybe it’s time to leave Australia to the Australians.

Maybe it’s time for me to move on.

In a recent post to the Without A Box forums I said that dealing with the Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification was something of a cross between Alice in Wonderland and Kafka’s The Castle.

But on Friday, after a nearly two hour long phone call where in we tried to get an explination as to why some sexually explicit films, such as 9 SONGS and NEW SEX POSITIONS, VOLUME 2 receive R-ratings, while DAMON AND HUNTER gets an X-rating, and can’t even get an exemption for a one-off screening at a Gay and Lesbian Documentary festival (”The OFLC is aware we’re discussing an award-winning documentary film, right?”), things took a turn for the truly bizzare.

Moments after hanging up the phone, we received, by post, a request from the OFLC to retain our film for use in their Classification Training Workshops.

No, I’m not kidding. The OFLC would like permission to lift 3-4 minute segments to be used on training members of the film, television and videogame industry about the classification process.

As you try to wrap your brain around this, please keep in mind that only two days before the OFLC informed us that if an Australian counterpart to The Institute for Gay Men’s Health or The San Francisco Sex Information Hotline were to use DAMON AND HUNTER with their clients, or merely kept the DVD on their library shelves, they would be subject to fine and jail time.

The mind reels.

Meanwhile, the butchered re-edited version of DAMON AND HUNTER, per the OFLC’s instructions has been submitted to the OFLC with the promise that we’ll have an answer within 48 hours as to whether or not they will allow queerDOC to screen the censored version. The entire 46 minutes, censored version can be viewed online here:

DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT FOR THE OFLC

The story has hit the Australian gay press:

DAMON AND HUNTER DO IT
by Myles Wearring
THE DIRECTOR OF DOCO DAMON AND HUNTER EXPLAINS HIS FRUSTRATION AT HAVING IT BANNED
http://www.ssonet.com.au/display.asp?ArticleID=5696

CENSOR MAY LIFT DOCO BAN
by Myles Wearring
A DOCUMENTARY FEATURING EXPLICIT GAY SEX MAY MAKE IT TO SYDNEY SCREENS, BUT ONLY WITH SOME HEAVY EDITS.
http://www.ssonet.com.au/display.asp?ArticleID=5681

GAY PORN DOCO BANNED
by Cathy Anderson
Porn is not classifed as art in a recent decision by Australian Censors
http://www.bnews.net.au/bnews_issues/b147/04.pdf

We’ve re-cut DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT TOGETHER as specificed by the Australian Office of Film and LIterature Classification, and we are offering it for free online viewing.

For those of you on the podcast trip, you can subscribe to the Comstock Films Video Podcast here:

feed://feeds.comstockfilms.com/ComstockFilmsVideoPodcast

If you’re not down with podcasts and you need a direct link to the media file on our podcast media host Libsyn, it’s here:

DAMON AND HUNTER: DOING IT FOR THE OFLC

I have just finished butchering a re-edit of DAMON AND HUNTER to remove all the the material the OFLC finds objectionable — no erect penises, not touching of each other’s flacid penises, and no butt cracks. I’m cooking it into a .m4v file and will post it to the blog when it’s finished.

In the meantime, yesterday an Australian journalist asked me if I had an “offical reaction” to the OFLC decission.

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 find myself unable to understand the censor’s rational for “protecting” adults from photographic images of sexuality. But allowing that I could be wrong about that, certainly adults don’t need to be protected from a film like DAMON AND HUNTER. DAMON AND HUNTERR is a film about what’s best in all of us.

I also don’t understand, in a country where the rules governing X-rated material are honored mostly in the breach, that the government has decided to put its foot down at an event like QueerDOC. It smacks of misplaced priorities and selective enforcement.

DAMON AND HUNTER seems caught in the gap between shabbily crafted video porn and “serious films” about sex like 9 SONGS or KEN PARK. I find the attitudes expressed about sex and the moving image in both of these approaches off-putting, or worse, dull, which I why I (try) to make earnest, well-crafted films about what a delightful part of life sex is for most people most of the time. I just don’t think the rules governing the OFLC ever anticipated a film like DAMON AND HUNTER, which although it’s completely explicit, arousing and erotic, is also completely joyful, and utterly appropriate for adults to enjoy watching in a cinema.

The film is an affirmation that physical love is a wonderful and wholesome part of our humanity. The need and desire to connect with another person in profoundly physical and intimate way is something we all easily recognize as one of the great gifts of being alive, and there’s something special about coming together as an audience, in a theater, and acknowledging and celebrating the innate goodness of our sexual nature.

The classification of DAMON AND HUNTER as X-rated (as our other films have also been classified by the OFLC) prevents these film from being seen as they were intended: in a theater where the power of the cinema can transform a house full of strangers into an audience. There is something magical about being in the dark, with a bunch of people you don’t know, all responding as one to the film. It’s amplifying and affirming of one’s own emotions. In the case of DAMON AND HUNTER I think there’s a good chance the wound is that much deeper because this film is a celebration of physical love between two men, and there are so very few examples in cinema of authentic gay sex being documented, let alone celebrated.

I’ve just found out directly from the OFLC that because of the film’s X-rating if an Australian gay men’s health center were to use DAMON AND HUNTER in the same way it’s being used here in the states by the San Francisco Sex Information Hotline and the Institute for Gay Men’s Health at GMHC, that the health center would be breaking the law. Unbelievable!

We have retained counsel and are currently acting with all possible speed to try and appeal the OFLC’s ruling and have DAMON AND HUNTER reclassified as R. But the catch 22 of the X rating is that it denies a film the revenues to be garnered by the wider distribution allowed R-rated films. Comstock Films is an completely independent operation. My wife and I finance our films independently, produce them independently, and distribute them independently. We don’t have the resources of time and money to battle the Australian government. The appeal itself costs $8,000, and if the OFLC denies our request for a waver, there won’t be much we can do. We’re exploring the idea of selling a “special edition” fundraising DVD at a premium price to finance the appeal, with the windfall donated to charity if the OFLC were to wave the fee, but the time table for organizing is tight.

What we do have is a lovely film, a film that can be defended both on principal *and* it’s merits as entertainment, a film an “ordinary Australian” doesn’t have to feel embarrassed about owning, watching, or speaking on behalf of. Perhaps that will count for something.

Click to see a larger version.

A special thanks to our sponsor My Secret Place, who generously provided funding for the printing of our posters and handbills for the QueerDOC screening. In addition to being a great place to buy our movies, they also have a fantastic collection of pleasure tools, including being the first Australian retailers for lovely Njoy stainless steel dildos and plugs.

My Secret Place
126 Leichhardt Street - Spring Hill
Queensland, Australia

Thanks Karen!

Regular readers have probably noticed that of late posting has been a little spotty.

Partly it’s because it’s August and there’s nothing I enjoy more than being on the water with my kids. A few more weeks and it’s back to school time, so I’m trying to get in as many beach hours with them as possible.

It’s also because MATT AND KHYM is taking up a lot of my creative energy. The problem (if one can even call it that) is that they’re too good. Their interview runs well over an hour, and it’s all good. Charming, sexy, sweet, humorous; it’s been really hard to figure how to cut in down to a managable length.

Lastly, I haven’t been writing in the blog much because I’ve been having to do A LOT of correspondence in support of DAMON AND HUNTER. It is abolutely our most successful release so far, both in terms of recognition and units shipped, and it turns out that trying to take advantage of that success take a lot of time.

We’ve been especially please with the reception DAMON AND HUNTER has received in Australia. It’s been covered in a number of magazines and newspapers, including DNA, The Melbourne Star, B-News, MCV, and QMagazine.

In July it played to an overflow audience at the Melbourne Underground Film Festival, and went on to be named Best Documentary at the fest. From there we were invited to show the film at QueerDOC, the world’s premiere gay and lesbian documentary film festival, in Sydney this September. All great news, with lots of thank you notes to write, journalist to talk to, and of course, boxes of DVDs to send to Australia.

Then late last week, the Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification dropped the hammer on DAMON AND HUNTER.

On the 15th, QueerDOC received notification from the OFLC that screening D&H would be a violation of Section 8 of the 2004 Film Festival Guidelines. That’s right, in Australia the government can tell you what you can and can’t show at a film festival.

What will happen now, I don’t know. The festival has already distributed nearly 50,000 copies of the program, including two screenings of DAMON AND HUNTER (which the festival expected would sell out). We’ve already printed up hundreds of posters and flyers and made arrangements to have them distributed throughout Sydney. The festival is currently in negotiations with the OFLC to see if they can show DAMON AND HUNTER in some sort of edited form, and we’re trying to make an appeal of the ratings. (Winterbottom’s 9 SONGS, a film that featured explicit footage of straight sex received a reduced rating from the OFLC. But without the major distributor backing of a film like 9 SONGS, and the very short notice, I’m doubtful our appeal will be successful.) If I were a betting man, I’d bet that Sydney is not going to get the chance to see the film that Melbourne enjoyed so very much.

And then there is still the question of what might happen to the organizers of the Melbourne Underground Film Festival and the owners of the venue that had the audacity to show DAMON AND HUNTER on not one, but two screens. Each violation of Section 8 is punishable by a year in jail and a $20,000 fine. Perhaps I felt a bit histrionic when I said that MUFF and Glitch were doing something courageous by showing DAMON AND HUNTER, but I don’t feel histrionic now.

Of all the films the OFLC might target for censorship, DAMON AND HUNTER seems like a particularly inappropriate choice. Aside from the recognition the film has so far received as an outstanding work of cinema, it’s also been recognized for it’s value as a life-affirming and educational document. DAMON AND HUNTER is held in the Kinsey Library at the world renowned Kinsey Institute at the University of Indiana. It’s already being used by the Gay Men’s Health Crisis in New York, and by the San Francisco Sex Information Hotline. Just this week it’s been being passed around by deligates at the 16th Annual World AIDS Conference in Toronto Cananda. Why? Because DAMON AND HUNTER is singular in it’s compassionate, humane, frank, and erotic depiction of gay love and gay sex.

And apparently that’s something that the government of Australia needs to keep the people of Sydney, especially the gay men of Sydney, from seeing.