Hollywood couple oppose Iraq attack

Robbins and Sarandon wanted to help firefighters

By Finlo Rohrer BBC News Online entertainment staff in Edinburgh

Hollywood couple Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon have spoken out about their fears of US plans for a war on Iraq.

The actors have been performing a play about the terror attacks of 11 September at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

At a press conference to talk about their roles in The Guys, which ends its three-night run on Friday, the pair said they were opposed to "military expansion".

Meanwhile, the director of a French film featuring a nine-minute rape scene, which had its UK première at the Edinburgh International Film Festival, has said he will not show it in the UK if censors demand cuts.

Speaking about Iraq, Sarandon said: "I don't think that a military expansion of violence is the solution."

"First you have to ask the right questions and we haven't formed the right questions on what's going on in the world right now. No, I don't think I would want to go to war against Iraq."

I don't think it will be released if it needs to be cut

Gaspar Noe

Robbins said performing in the play had been a cathartic experience because he, like everyone, had felt helpless as he watched the atrocities of 11 September happening around him.

Frustrating

"Everyone in New York wanted to do something. They wanted to help and be physically involved," he said.

"They wanted to go and dig and they couldn't so it was very frustrating.

"They didn't want to stay at home and watch TV. They wanted to be there helping."

They added that they did not think it was the play's responsibility to examine the political affects of the attacks.

Sarandon, who admitted stage fright ahead of her Edinburgh debut, said: "It's about the firefighters. It's about one woman's encounter with a man who is trying to cope with this unexpected and inexplicable loss that he wasn't prepared for."

The couple also said the play had received an emotional but warm reception when it played to a theatre full of New York firefighters.

Journalists have fainted at screenings of Irreversible

Controversial film Irreversible had its first British public showing on Thursday night at Edinburgh's film festival, causing one cinema-goer to faint and a number to walk out.

Starring one of France's most glamorous couples - Monica Belluci and Vincent Cassel - it is a brutal tale of rape and bloody efforts at revenge shot in a grainy documentary style.

Director Gaspar Noe said walk-outs were not necessarily a bad thing.

"That doesn't mean that people hate the movie, it just means that people can't handle the emotions on the screen.

"They don't get the whole experience, they just get the dark part and animal part of the movie.

"I have walked out from movies - Straw Dogs and almost from Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

"[The public] know what they are paying for and think they are strong enough to take it."

Oxygen

When the film was shown at the Cannes festival in May, 250 people walked out, with 20 needing oxygen after fainting.

And at a press and industry screening in Edinburgh this week, a number of journalists walked out in disgust.

I'm told somebody fainted but came back to watch the rest of the film

Shane Danielsen
Festival director

But Noe said if British censors wanted cuts to any scene in the film - which features rape, sodomy and savage violence - it would be ruined.

"I don't think it will be released if it needs to be cut. You will notice something has been cut, you will notice the presence of the censors."

He said the fact it had been shown in competition in Cannes and given a 16 certificate in France meant it was suitable to be shown uncut in the UK, adding: "The most bourgeois film festival in the world has shown it in competition."

Belluci - who stars in the forthcoming Matrix sequel - has admitted she cannot watch some of the scenes.

Masochists

The film reverses chronological order to tell the story of her brutal rape in a subway and her boyfriend's quest to track down the rapist.

Noe said like Straw Dogs, the movie would become less controversial with time.

"Nothing's controversial after 20 years, even after five years."

Insisting American war films which glorified military technology and killing were worse, the director said nobody could find the rape scenes titillating.

"The only people who could get turned on are masochists."

Festival artistic director Shane Danielsen told BBC News Online the public screening had gone well with only six or seven audience members walking out.

"I'm told somebody fainted but came back to watch the rest of the film. It shows the press are a lot more oversensitive."