TIFF Report:  OBSCENE Review

Obscene tells the story of Rosset’s life from childhood until now, focusing largely on the Grove Press heyday and he makes for a fascinating subject.  Starting life after school as a war photographer the young idealist initially tried his hand as a film maker with a politically charged film about racial injustice - remember, this was 1948 - before marrying into Jackson Pollock’s circle of friends and, in his own words, accidentally ending up at the helm of a tiny publishing company that had put out three books before being abandoned.  This was Grove, the company that Rosset would use to overturn most of the country’s anti-obscenity laws.  Starting with Lady Chatterly’s Lover - a book he doesn’t particularly like but felt would be more easily defensible than his real targets - Rosset set out to ‘rescue’ what he considered important works of art that were being blocked by the laws of the time.  Each success would lead to greater challenges until, thanks to more happy accidents and the good fortune of being able to easily tap into the US counterculture movement, Rosset was at the head of a multi-million dollar business with its hands in serious publishing, film distribution, magazines, and pulpy Victorian erotica.

Rosset is a fascinating subject, still possessed of a remarkably nimble mind well into his eighties, and gives refreshingly frank interviews.  Better yet, he’s also a bit of a pack rat and has maintained a sizeable archive of family movies, radio interviews, television appearances and the like, all of which have been made available to the film makers.  The end result is a warm and intimate look at a political radical who managed to change his world while also turning a tidy profit.  That is, of course, until times changed and it all crumbled down around him.  The women’s movement turned on him first, then there was the attempted unionization of his company and, most dramatically, the bombing of the Grove Press offices in the wake of publishing the Che Guevara diary.

The great blessing that is Rosset’s charm and frankness is also something of a curse for the picture.  The film makers do such an admirable job of portraying Rosset the man that it makes you want more and once the credits roll some surprising omissions become obvious.  How, for example, is it possible that a film about obscenity never actually raises the issue of what Rosset himself would consider obscene?  An excerpted letter he sent to the publisher of Screw Magazine certainly seems to indicate that he had his limits and his lines but the film never raises that point whatsoever.  Likewise, while there are some external interviews cut in to sum up the ongoing effects of Rosset’s work there is surprisingly little in there to really establish the political context of the times, there is only what information Rosset raises himself.  Rather than getting into broad context issues the film exists within a Rosset-sized bubble which is certainly entertaining and enlightening in its own right but seems to be at least a little bit of a missed opportunity.  Still, it’s always better to leave the audience wanting more, yes?  What the film does it does remarkably well, drawing attention to a man who deserves to be a household name but has been reduced to little more than a footnote.  Next time you visit your local book store, thank god for Barney Rosset.