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Title Mysterious Skin
Copyright Title Mysterious Skin
Released 2004
Production Year 2004
Director Gregg Araki
Comments Given the media hype surrounding the film, its supposed controversial subject matter, and my admiration of Gregg Araki’s previous film, I was obviously very keen to watch Mysterious Skin to help assist my research on film censorship in Australia. Mysterious Skin turned out to be one of the most arresting and deeply moving films that I have ever experienced.



The beautifully lush, ethereal, spellbinding cinematography complemented by the haunting, ubiquitous soundtrack consumes, dislocates and distorts. It is very hard to explain in words how Araki ingeniously makes you want to be transported to this world, and at the same time pray upon your life that you will never be subjected to a world like that. But you realise that this is our world, and we are in it, awake, now.



Throughout the film I kept questioning to myself how someone would or could want to ever ban this film. Australian Attorney-General Phillip Ruddock accused Mysterious Skin as been a “how-to-manual” for paedophiles. I didn’t attend the cinema to watch Mysterious Skin to learn how to be a paedophile, I strongly doubt anybody would. Put simply, if you are a paedophile, you are a paedophile, and you know what you are doing. Above all, it appears to be an easy yet very damning label to place on a film, especially if you haven’t seen it…



There are a couple of intense scenes where I felt paralysed. I felt like I couldn’t watch but I felt like I couldn’t turn away from it. There was nothing worthy of being banned. Mysterious Skin appears to be misunderstood by those who tried to ban it. It is a tender approach to child abuse and paedophilia, a film which I feel would help victims heal inner demons and come to terms with dark pasts. The film offers hope.



By attempting to ban Mysterious Skin one is essentially sweeping the issue under the carpet, by child abuse and paedophilia as subjects too confronting to discuss. Araki’s voice is one of concern. The film expresses the voices of victims. It is not a threat to our society, it a brave and bold film which says more about the society we live in than anything else.





Dominique Chaleyer 2005
Synopsis ""The summer I was eight years old, five hours disappeared from my life. Five hours, lost, gone without a trace..."

These are the words of Brian Lackey (Brady Corbet), a troubled 18 year-old, growing up in the stiflingly small town of Hutchinson, Kansas. Plagued by nightmares, Brian believes that he may have been the victim of an alien abduction. Local Neil McCormick (Joseph Gordon Levitt) however, is the ultimate beautiful outsider. With a loving but promiscuous mother (Elisabeth Shue), Neil is wise beyond his years and curious about his developing sexuality, having found what he perceived to be love from his Little League baseball coach (played by Hal Hartley veteran Bill Sage) at a very early age. Now, ten years later, Neil is a teenage hustler, nonchalant about the dangerous path his life is taking.

Neil's pursuit of love leads him to New York City, while Brian's voyage of self discovery leads him to Neil - who helps him to unlock the dark secrets of their past. Based on the acclaimed novel by Scott Heim, MYSTERIOUS SKIN explores the hearts and minds of two very different boys who come to find the key to their future happiness lies in the exorcism of their collective demons." By Gregg Araki, from http://www.mysteriousskinthemovie.com (2004)
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