My Own Private Guantanamo

Pranks, Power and Pop Culture


An Open Letter to the BBFC

June 9, 2011

Dear British Board of Film Classification,

Congratulations on your wise decision to ban The Human Centipede II (Full Sequence) from release or distribution in the United Kingdom. Please consider these further suggestions to protect the moral and aesthetic sensibilities of the British moviegoing public.

1. Please ban all Shrek movies, spinoffs, merchandise and promotional materials. Please take extra care to prevent the UK staging of Shrek: The Musical. Think of the children.

2. Please ban any adaptation of a Phillip K. Dick story or novel by people who have never read a Phillip K. Dick story or novel. Also, please ban any movies by people who have never read a book.

3. Please ban all movies in which Clint Eastwood plays a Christ figure and/or a bitter, racist old man.

4. Please ban any movie in which a serial killer teaches life lessons or moral principles to his victims.

5. Please ban any movie in which the protagonist is secretly schizophrenic, dreaming or embroiled in a “cutting edge psychological roleplay” which will all be explained in the final ten minutes.

6. Please ban any zombie movies, in which the zombies are capable of running quickly. This is just wrong and promotes anti-scientific beliefs.

7. Please ban Terrence Malick’s Tree of Life until he cuts or reshoots the silly beach scene at the end of the film. Also, please take out the CGI dinosaurs and the third brother.

8. Please ban uplifting movies about the Holocaust.

9. Please ban all rotoscope animation children’s movies– especially those by Robert Zemeckis– until the “uncanny valley” problem is solved. These movies are giving me nightmares and I suspect I am not alone.

10. Please ban any movie in which Owen Wilson or Kenneth Branagh plays “the Woody Allen character.” Also, please ban any movie in which a curmudgeonly senior citizen gets a “new lease on life” after falling in love with an attractive and shallow young woman.

11. Please ban for US distribution any British movie described by American critics as “enchanting.”

12. Please ban the release of any Judd Apatow “bromance” which does not feature explicit depictions of loving and mutually satisfying gay sex between Seth Rogen, Paul Rudd and Jason Segel.

13. Please ban any movie in which a magical African American character dispenses advice to the white protagonists and then dies or sacrifices himself to move the plot forward.

14. Please ban any film adaptation of a Tucker Max script. And please pass legislation to chemically castrate all parties involved in the production and distribution of I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell.

15. Please ban The Hangover 3 and please put Bradley Cooper on a no-fly list.

16. Please ban the release of the movie version of the TV show 24 unless it ends with hero Jack Bauer facing a war crimes trial in the Hague.

17. Please ban Zack Snyder.

Best Regards,









  • Withercanada

    why are you hating on 28 days later or Blade Runner?

  • Anonymous

    No hate for Blade Runner whatsoever. 28 Days Later has fast zombies, though. This is just WRONG.

  • Withercanada

    okay, sorry. I still think 28 Days later needs love though.And I too would love to see Paul Rudd do some heavy pedding, but only if it’s with Viggo Mortison. I absolutely love Rudd though; Role Models may be one of the best comedies of the last decade and he made up for the rather meh fest that was Knocked Up. Seth Rogan has been more enjoyable in smaller or supporting roles, I kinda wanna see Paul and Green Hornet though.

  • Anonymous

    Please ban the following, at your earliest convenience:

    Any movie that purports to Uplift and Humanize Other but really is just a back-patting ode to The Good Whites Do (without which, of course, They couldn’t make it).

    Any movie previously a play, where the stage director directs the film version.

    Any movie using female characters’ oppression as a metaphor for gay men’s suffering and/or eventual Triumph.

    Any academy-award winning movie or one that makes massive box office that doesn’t pass the Bechdel test.

    Any movie written by someone who got a movie deal because they manufactured experience just so they’d have something to write about. Purposeful Hacks are the worst.

  • Anonymous

    In defense of the vehicle that introduced me to Cillian Murphy, and was sweetly unobsessed with its interracial love story, and scared the holy hell outta me with those fast zombies (oooh, espcially in the tunnel – they’re coming! they’re coming!) . . . they weren’t zombies, they were Us. I know, I know, it’s technically a zombie movie, but since they’re not really dead and all, the speediness can be excused, just because it rocks!

  • Alex

    You forgot one – Please ban any movie where a middle class white teacher comes into an inner city school and teaches all the poor ethnic children that they too can learn and go to college. 

  • Anonymous

    Yes, ban that shit too!

blog comments powered by Disqus