F*CK: The Film That Dare Not Speak Its Name
- Posted: 25th Mar 2010
- Category: Reviews
Steve Anderson’s FUCK is an entertaining, thoughtful, if a little misshapen and somewhat laboured documentary about that ultimate 'sentence enhancer’. Featuring a relentless barrage of talking-head interviews, Anderson attempts to put the word 'f*ck' right at the very centre of the debate on free speech, seeking out the opinion of everyone - and at times it seems, anyone. In-between original animation from Oscar nominee Bill Plympton and classic expletive-laden film and television clips, a host of scholars, linguists, comedians, actors and writers all jostle for screen time. Although FUCK lacks both the panache and sadly the humour of its cinematic forebear The Aristocrats, the interviews with Pat Boone - as bizarre and brilliant as he was in Michael Moore’s Roger & Me - and with foul-mouthed American rapper Ice-T, almost justify the 90-minute length alone. The THINKFilm documentary is also home to a genuine treasure: the last known filmed interview with notorious inebriate and father of Gonzo journalism, Hunter S Thompson, who despite clearly fading health, packs just as strong a satirical punch. 
Predictably provocative, the film examines both the long-history of the word - the origin of which remains a complete mystery - and almost every conceivable impact it has on our lives. It debunks the popular misconception that ‘f*ck' is an acronym for ‘Fornication Under Consent of the King’, explores its remarkable linguistic versatility and examines how one simple four-letter-word can polarise opinion so sharply. The diversity of interviewees from Reinhold Albert Aman and Kevin Smith to Drew Carey and Ron Jeremy, plus the wealth of clips from famous foul-mouthed films such as Sideways and The Big Lebowski, help ensure that FUCK delivers not only a few laughs, but an insightful cultural debate too.Disappointingly however, Anderson’s film lacks clarity and meanders throughout. While there are indeed many fascinating elements to FUCK, Janet Jackon’s Superbowl ‘wardrobe malfunction’ or a Scandinavian rock-group having sex live on stage have got little to do with the infamous F-word and their inclusion is tenuous, distracting and ultimately unnecessary. Also, despite being generally slick and energetic, the edit is on occasions very clumsy, failing to create convincing ‘conversations’ between the contributors, as the director clearly set out to do. Where Anderson does succeed is by remaining detached and relatively neutral throughout, presenting the viewer with both sides of a prickly argument. We meet those who think the word is a stain on our collective subconscious like Robert Peters of Morality in Media or right-wing watchdog Michael Medved, and also people like Billy Connolly who revel in using it.
The word ‘f*ck’ has always had an uncanny ability to cross languages and cultural barriers, unfortunately FUCK is probably just too US-centric to fare quite so well. That said, if you want to learn about the word, what it means, how it’s used and why many people enjoy using it so much – this film is about as definitive as it gets.
FUCK is available on DVD from ICA Films. For more details click here.