Page 30 - Alternative Europe Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema Since 1945

of which aim to elevate the status of the films under review. While Paulsson believes that the inclusion
of these activities confirm the Fantastisk Film Festival as a 'great meeting place for open minded
people', they also serve to underscore the critical dimension to film viewing that holds sway at this and
other key events within the European Federation of Fantastic Film Festivals.
It still remains a matter of debate as to what extent alternative European film practice can be of
any significant use in thinking about, or even intervening in, the world as it stands. Previous essays
may have mentioned 'guerilla cinema' (Mathijs), 'questioning memory' (Blake, Kercher), or 'teenage
disobedience' (Fay) and 'lawlessness' (Barry), but can alternative European cinema really take a
practical political position? This question informs the last chapter in this book, Benjamin Halligan's
'The Tasks of the European Underground: A Letter to Luis Bunuel'. Halligan raises the question
of what constitutes underground and exploitation cinema, the political use of it, its aesthetics (or
lack of it) or its directness? His arguments are reminiscent of the theatre of cruelty, as propagated by
Antonin Artaud, and the subsequent cinema of cruelty that André Bazin favoured.12 It champions
films that urge for immediacy, firmly rooted in what Halligan calls their experiential exploitativeness,
showing instead of abstracting, attacking instead of contemplating. Throughout Halligan's letter,
European alternative cinema is set up as that which cannot be commodified because, as Halligan
observes particularly in Un chien andalou and Los Olvidados, it attacks the audience rather than points
towards itself; it does not allow for excessive self-reflection; it just displays. It is exactly through this
confrontational display, Halligan suggests, that the straightforwardness with which Bufiuel's films (as
opposed to the ones of Jen-Luc Godard or Michael Haneke) snap out at the viewer. However, since
it does not allow for contemplation, it must hence be disregarded as useless or ethically unsound.
This uselessness through immediacy, much like porn, is what constitutes the European underground
and exploitation cinema. As Halligan points out, these films do not allow us a critical distance from
the horrors that are shown - rather, they position themselves squarely in front of the viewer. At the
same time, Halligan also calls attention to the moral discussions about cultural and social inequalities
and injustices these films inevitably bring about. Even in their ugly forms, and as Halligan suggests
precisely because of that form, they are often more accurate accusations than cleverly constructed
campaigns. But because of their ugliness they are also morally undesirable, often inviting a counter-
reaction. Building on that, and employing the works of Walter Benjamin and linking them to
instances of the neutralisation of radicalness in Europe (issues also addressed by Jennifer Fay and
Christopher Barry), Halligan then argues for a thorough reconsideration of what exactly the relevance
of such underground and exploitation cinema can be, concluding that the roughness and in-your-
face attitude of what he labels the Bunuelian underground is saved by its contemporaneity (not its
timelessness).

RESEARCHING TRASH, CULT AND ALTERNATIVE CINEMA

The essays included in this collection investigate the national traditions of European trash and
exploitation from a variety of perspectives, as well incorporating filmmakers' commentaries and
exhibition strategies alongside 'traditional' academic approaches. In this respect Alternative Europe
represents part of a larger examination of global cult and popular cinema currently being undertaken

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