UK: London in the Raw from the BFI's Flipside

[MarcMorris]

London in the Raw (Arnold Louis Miller, 1964)
UK / colour / Cert tbc / 76 min and 47 min versions + 80 mins extra material / ratio 1.33:1 / optional subtitles for hearing-impaired / DVD cat no: BFIVD840 / BD cat no: BFIB1021

'The world's greatest city laid bare! Thrill to its gay excitement, its bright lights, but be shocked by the sin in its shadows!'

Following on from his Take Off Your Clothes and Live, and influenced by the world-wide success of Italian 'Mondo' movies, which combined documentary footage with staged sequences to salacious effect, legendary British low budget movie mogul Arnold Miller concocted this fascinating exploitation-style documentary. Peering voyeuristically behind the grimy net-curtains of London life into seedy bars and clubs for beatnik 'art lovers', and burrowing beneath the glittering façade of the capital's glamorous cocktail lounges and casinos, London in the Raw provides a cynical, sometimes startling vision of life on and off the rain-spattered streets of 1960s London.

BFI "Flipside" Press Release

Special features:

• Remastered to HD from the original negative
• Three 60s 'London Sketches': Pub (Peter Davis, 1962, 26 mins); Strip (Peter Davis, Staffan Lamm, Don DeFina, 1965, 26 mins); Chelsea Bridge Boys (Peter Davis, Staffan Lamm, 1966, 28 mins)
• Original trailer
• Original UK and continental versions of the feature
• Illustrated booklet with essay by novelist and critic Stewart Home (author of Down and Out in Shoreditch and Hoxton); original review and promotional material

DVD: amazon.co.uk | play.com

Blu-ray: amazon.co.uk | play.com

More titles from the BFI's Flipside label

[MarcMorris]

London In The Raw Blu-ray reviewed at DVD Times

[Eric B]

All the BFI Flipside releases deserve lots of press.

Criterion should be all over this kind of release. Their Eclipse line could benefit.