Tuesday 16 February 2010

Chris Morris - Four Lions


The revered satirist and much lauded comedy genius, Chris Morris, is back with his big screen directorial début 'Four Lions'. Having already tackled many of the themes discussed in 'Being Bad' in the highly controversial 'Brass Eye', he is now ready to take on the next taboo; Islamic terrorism.
Four Lions follows a group of Jihadi Muslims intent on perpetrating a terrorist act. Set between England and Pakistan, the protagonists bungle their way through a series of tragicomic set pieces on their road to martyrdom. In a recent interview Morris said he wished to explore 'The Dad's Army' side of terrorism.
He is venturing into the unknown with this new work. To my knowledge, no one has ever portrayed a group so reviled by society as real characters before. Sure, we've all seen documentaries and read press articles on the subject, but all that we see are faceless monsters who are intent on the destruction of western society.
Morris' usual tactic is to expose hypocrisy where it exists and to lampoon the spoon fed views held by much of middle England by using deliberately provocative imagery and language. If you're not familiar with his work, firstly, why not? and secondly, you can watch clips from 'Brass Eye' here and 'The Day Today' here.
Are there some subjects which should not be the subject of comedy? Will Morris' inimitable style change with this new work? Will he limit the ferocity of his attack because of the delicate and controversial subject matter? All shall be revealed in May. If you don't choose to go and see it, you will certainly be reading about it in the Daily Mail.

2 comments:

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