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Taking Liberties

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by Jenny Saunders
Taking Liberties is Britain’s answer to Farenheit 9/11 according to its promoters, and there’s a lot of merit in this comparison. But don’t expect to see a loud bearded man chasing after the bad guys. For this is an essentially and brilliantly British film – and an important one to watch.

The film (by first-time doc director Chris Atkins) is a devastating critique of the way that civil liberties have been systematically undermined in the UK since Blair came into power: from the right to protest to the prohibition of torture – plus many other liberties you may not yet know that you have lost.
 
The loss of liberties might sound dry to some people. But the emotional force of the stories that the mild-mannered Atkins catalogues, combined with his lightness of touch and fantastic animation by Simon Robson, makes for a film that is wickedly funny and shocking in turn.  Taking Liberties celebrates the very best of British spirit, in the face of New Labour’s authoritarian creep. Along with old favourites like peace-campaigner Brian Haw, we meet fantastic new characters, from vicars to demure-looking pensioners, who have faced violence and imprisonment in the fight for our liberties.
 
We also meet profoundly tragic stories, like that of Algerian asylum-seeker Mouloud Sihali whose 2 year virtual house arrest is ongoing, despite the fact he was cleared entirely by the courts of any wrongdoing.

Taking Liberties is not perfect. Its interpretation of 20th century history is sometimes far-fetched, and it suffers for the fact that (unlike Moore) Atkins chose not to document the rejections he received when seeking to interview those who could make a case for ‘the other side’. But nonetheless it is a very sharp and challenging film.

One of its most shocking aspects is the record it provides of police brutality and sometimes oafish behaviour towards mild-mannered citizens who have challenged Blair’s laws. The police are just doing their jobs of course, and these changes of laws have made them unenviable jobs to say the least. But their behaviour is a troubling taster of what may follow the loss of liberties – and the succession of pretenders to Blair’s throne who were shown waving vacuously at the camera as they proceeded about their Westminster business offered little by way of reassurance.

This is one film where I definitely hope that ‘documentary’ can serve a galvanising purpose. Watch it, and you’ll see what I mean.
Dir. Chris Atkins, UK 2007, 90 mins approx
Released in the UK on the 8th June
See www.noliberties.com

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