75 years of the Russian off Grays Inn Road, London WC1 Friday October 23, 730pm 26 Sept, 1992 No. 28 In defence of October (United Secretariat of the Fourth International)
Kingsway College Introducting your Republocrat candidate - Bob Roberts Bob Roberts Written, directed by and starring Tim Robbins Reviewed by Kate Ahrens When the credits came up at the end of Bob Roberts, the entire cinema sat in silence. It took a good two or three minutes before anyone got their breath back enough to move.
This film has such a powerful message and hits you with such force, that some time to recover is essential.
It is a story, in documentary campaign trail of Bob Roberts, a folk-singing, entrepreneurial right-winger.
The film follows Roberts and his entourage on their campaign bus from one town to the next where he plays concerts, finds photo-opportunities with small children and promotes himself through Broken Dove' his anti-drugs charity.
Wonderfully funny and terrifyingly serious at the same time, the film manages to combine humour and stark reality to create a chilling vision of what is happening today in American politics.
It was one of the most frightening films I have seen for a long time. Not because it was full of scary moments, but because it was so easy to see elements of Bob Roberts in all of the politicians leading America, not to mention the rest of the world. And it was also far too easy to believe that the opposition to the sort of crass offensiveness that Roberts comes out with is so muted.
It doesn't seem strange that hardly anybody even seems to notice how offensively racist and sexist he is. Even the opposition that does appear is centred around allegations of corruption, not about what he is actually saying.
This film has so few faults that I'm finding it difficult not to just say 'It's brilliant - go and see it' and not even attempt a criticism. I can't say that I enjoyed this film because it made me think too much about the vicious and repressive nature of the society we live in - but then, that is what it intended to do.
People should go and see this film. It presents a vision, not of the future, but of the present, that gives a chilling clarity to what the real issues facing us all are.
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