Martin Bürgin enjoys the thrill of scandal. He analyses films that have shocked us, and discusses them with the general public in his role as the longstanding curator of a film series. | Image: Fabian Hugo, taken in the Kino Rex in Bern.

Martin Bürgin, why did the Netflix film ‘Don’t look up’ get so much press last year?

Because it deals with topics that are being hotly debated in the media right now. The film features a comet whose existence some people simply refuse to acknowledge. It’s used as a metaphor for those who deny global warming, and also pillories political populism and all the different groupings that won’t listen to each other. What’s more, the film features a lot of big stars, which makes it exciting for the media.

Are you saying that the film wouldn’t have been as successful if it hadn’t starred Meryl Streep, Leonardo Di Caprio et al.?

We’d be justified in asking whether anyone will bother to talk about ‘Don’t look up’ 20 years from now. There are other films that are more successful in addressing climate change.

Let’s stay with ‘Don’t look up’ for a moment: Can this film educate people?

(Laughs) Ah, cinema as a means of education – that’s the dream of all activist movie-makers and propaganda ministries! Ultimately, your question is difficult to answer. What we can be sure of, however, is this: From the 1980s onwards, more and more films were made about humans destroying the environment, about global warming, deforestation or the aftermath of nuclear catastrophes. In fact, they were often made with an educational intent. They played with our fears, in hopes of getting the audience to adopt a more sustainable approach to Nature.

What films do you mean?

I’m thinking of ‘The Day After’, for example, or blockbusters like ‘Waterworld’, ‘The Day after Tomorrow’ or ‘Avatar’. But there were also smaller-scale productions like ‘Tank Girl’ and animated films like ‘Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind’ and ‘Princess Mononoke’.

Kevin Costner’s ‘Waterworld’? That’s not very deep.

(Laughs) That’s a good point. But action-packed blockbusters reach a large audience – even those that don’t seem to have a connection to environmental politics. The premise of ‘Waterworld’ is that the ice caps have melted, mostly flooding the Earth. People live on makeshift islands and are desperate to find fertile soil. The image of the Earth as a world of water is a striking one. ‘Tank Girl’ dates from the same time. It’s about a punk girl who lives in a tank and fights against the big corporations. In contrast to ‘Waterworld’, global warming in ‘Tank Girl’ has turned the Earth into a desert. So we here have two different scenarios that illustrate the possible consequences of global warming, both filmed in 1995. ‘Tank Girl’ is also about so-called predatory capitalism and globalisation. Its discourse is typical of the 1990s: governments losing power, and big companies dominating the world.

These films reflect societal fears. But might they in fact intensify those fears instead of combatting them?

I’m not so sure. The medium of film can change debates by transforming technical and political discussions into stories in the form of images, sounds and catchy dialogue. These are then taken up by the general public. Above all, films have the potential to produce iconic images – such as the mushroom clouds over peaceful Kansas in ‘The Day After’, the flash after the atomic bomb is detonated, the wall of fire, then the nuclear fallout that covers everything. These are mighty images that imprinted themselves on the minds of the public and became part of their collective memory. This is where I think the great power of cinema lies. We think we know what a nuclear war looks like, even though we have never seen one.

Can you give me a current example of this iconic power?

‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ was made into a TV series during the Donald Trump presidency. It depicts a dystopian, Christian fundamentalist society that is patriarchal and totalitarian, and in which fertility has become a rare commodity. Women who are capable of childbearing are kept as sex slaves. Activists began dressing as ‘handmaids’ when protesting against Trump, especially when Brett Kavanaugh was nominated to the Supreme Court – an evangelical Christian who had been accused of sexual assault. By protesting in the costume of the handmaids, the activists used the iconography of the TV series to link Kavanaugh to the patriarchal, theocratic system of power depicted there.

Some films trigger a storm of indignation – like ‘Kids’ from the year 1995, which featured sex scenes with underage youths. Is that a typical topic for causing controversy?

Underage sex in the cinema undoubtedly has the potential to cause a scandal. ‘Kids’ was accused of being voyeuristic soft porn and borderline paedophilic. It’s important to note that it was produced by Disney, a company keen to project a family-friendly image. But the socio-political value of the film lies in the way it helped to shape the debate about HIV. It was depicted without any compromises, couched in the language of the youth of the day, featured amateur actors, and was shot with handheld cameras. All that conveys a sense of authenticity, which is precisely why it was a success. It, too, is an iconic film.

Can films like ‘Kids’ break down taboos?

Sure, because they either initiate or intensify debate. Taboos are ultimately deprived of their status by being discussed in public. But this is not a linear process. Taboos that we might imagine have long been overcome can return again. What’s more, different societal groups have different views on what ought to be taboo, and what not.

When ‘The Last Temptation of Christ’ was released in 1988, the groups for and against it pounced on each other. There were even actual attacks against cinemas. Why?

Martin Scorsese depicted Jesus as a man full of self-doubt, but also as a man with dreams and desires. A very human Jesus, in other words. There is a dream sequence in the film in which he has sex with Mary Magdalen. For many believers, that made Jesus way too human, and it set off major protests all round the world. Several countries censored the film. But at the same time, progressive theologians welcomed how Jesus was shown in it. You can sum up the problem by asking two questions: What do we actually think of Jesus? And what are the boundaries of what can be shown?

The list of ‘scandalous films’ on the German-language Wikipedia site doesn’t extend further than the film ‘Antichrist’ from the year 2009. Are we immune to scandal today?

(Laughs.) If you mean cinema in the West, then yes: it’s pretty quiet on all fronts today.

And outside the West?

Things are different there. This year, for example, the Netflix movie ‘Perfect Strangers’ triggered a scandal in Egypt. The film in itself is harmless: it’s about a group of friends, male and female, who sit down together and decide to show each other their mobile phone messages for the rest of the evening. The topics raised include not just sex, but homosexuality. The outrage it caused in Egypt ended in campaigns on social media, lawsuits, and even attacks on Netflix from members of parliament.

Are we seeing the dawn of a new era?

Access to films is indeed changing thanks to Netflix and the other streaming channels. Streaming puts limits on film censorship, which makes it different from the cinema or state-controlled TV. Viewers can watch these films in private, without any societal control. This also means that streaming services can target new markets – and they’re being successful at it. ‘Perfect Strangers’ was the most-watched Netflix film in Egypt in January 2022. This also proves again that scandals generate an audience. Above all, scandalisation processes are essentially being globalised. I find that exciting.

For several years now, you have been curating a series of controversial films in Baden in the canton of Aargau. Why?

I find it appealing to discuss scientific and societal issues in a cultural setting. The various processes of scandalisation can provide us with clear evidence of how different social groups with different world views can clash, often in a highly emotional manner, as was the case with ‘Kids’ and ‘The Last Temptation of Christ’.

But you also show racist films, and you’ve been criticised for it.

That’s true. But we debate the films. ‘Jud Süss’, for example, was one of the Nazis’ big propaganda movies, and in dramaturgical terms it was cleverly done. A historian friend of mine told me it shouldn’t be shown in public. I see it differently. By deconstructing films like ‘Jud Süss’, we take away their supposed aura. It’s more dangerous to treat that film as if it had the power to change people’s minds of its own accord, turning them into anti-Semites. On the contrary: it’s my view that we create its aura when we refrain from subjecting it to critique. In this case, I believe in the enlightening power of scholarship.