Punk Doc Film Festival
Screw South by Southwest, Cannes, Toronto and all those other stuffy film fests. All you need to enjoy your own private cinema celebration is an Internet connection and a short attention span. We can’t promise the same quality as the aforementioned festivals, but at least there aren’t any lines, concessions are free and all the films are about punk rock. Here’s a look at some of what’s out there and online:
Directed by Lech Kowalski, the 1980 punk rock documentary “D.O.A.” is a great time capsule of early punk rock that features classic footage of the seven-city U.S. tour. from the Sex Pistols in 1978. It also features performances from X-Ray Spex, Dead Boys and Generation X, plus interviews with Joe Strummer, Sid Vicious and more.
Sammy McBride is famous for being the singer of influential Bay Area punk band Fang. But he’s more famous for having murdered his girlfriend. This mini-doc looks at his life and crimes.
Take a peek at the lives of some London squatters who spare for change and charge tourists a couple quid to pose for photos. Perhaps the best thing about this 1983 short film however is the juxtaposition of the narrator’s upper-class British accent against the lower-class British imagery.
You may not get the whole film, but you do get six minutes of a documentary about influential Virginia punk band Avail.
Produced by a student for their high school A/V class, this is a 26-minute documentary from 1984 on the punk scene in Raleigh, North Carolina. The film features interviews with local NC bands and fans and features a performance by Battalion of Saints.
This history of American punk was made as an assignment for an American History class and features Iggy, Ramones, Velvet Underground, et al. We’d give it an A.
This one is called “Punkture: A History of Punk Anti-Culture,” and the voice-over sounds like a computer, which is a really odd choice.
We can’t tell you much about this Subhumans doc since it’s hosted on some weird Russian site and well, we’re not fluent in that. Thankfully, we are fluent in the Subhumans’ brand of international punk rock.
This 1976 doc focuses on the emerging punk scene and features performances and interviews from The Sex Pistols, Clash and Siouxsie and the Banshees.
Well-made doc that traces the female influence in punk via Siouxsie, Gaye Advert, Poly Styrene and others.
A 1987 film focusing on the Tampa punk scene.
If you’re not from London, Ontario you may not know most of the bands and punks featured, but it’s an interesting look at one scene’s rich history.
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