AUSTIN TANNENBAUM

ARTANNENBAUM@GMAIL.COM
INSTAGRAM


Austin is an MA candidate in Creative Publishing and Critical Jounralism at the New School for Social Research. After receiving his BA in communications at The Johnston Center for Integrative Studies at the University of Redlands, he’s gained nearly a decade of professional journalism experience. His musical project is called Learning.


FILM.



SCUM

1979 | DIRECTED BY ALAN CLARKE 
Fifteen of the most brutal final minutes on film. I really almost couldn’t bear it, I had to dial down the sound.

Thought of Noe’s refusal to look away, and how he must have been influenced by this, particularly in Irreversible.

Scum is for all intents and purposes a masterpiece. From the acting to the pacing to the storylines, it grabs you — chokes you — and doesn’t let go.

The whole runtime is an illustration of how educational-disciplinary institutions mirror the capitalist workplace, preparing hapless kids for a lifetime of exploited wage labor, or else. 

Hierarchy, grift, compulsory obedience, engineered mutual distrust, sanctioned violence, human disposability — it’s all there in the borstal system.

Definitely the Clarke to start with; ironically I’m ending with it, but at least I can say I unintentionally saved the best for last.




READ HERE.