AVI WATCHDOG
Jean-Pierre Léaud stars in Jacques Rivette’s OUT 1, one of literally thousands of cinematic rarities presently available only as a file-sharing download online.
OUT 1 1971
By Brad Stevens
If one were making a list of subjects guaranteed to arouse controversy, the downloading of films using peer-to-peer com- puter networks would surely ap- pear near the top, perhaps second only to the Middle East conflict. It is now almost impos- sible to play a DVD issued by one of the major American studios without being obliged to sit through an advert claiming that illegal downloading is morally in- distinguishable from stealing a car; indeed, so pervasive has this advert become that watching il- legally downloaded films might
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well be the only way of avoiding it! There is little doubt that indi- viduals who upload the contents of discs released by fringe com- panies—especially those compa- nies making an effort to release high quality, uncut transfers of arthouse and exploitation films unlikely to sell in large numbers— are behaving reprehensibly. But what tends to be ignored in these debates is the fact that The Pi- rate Bay, Cinemageddon, eMule, Karagarga and other similar op- erations provide access to rari- ties that are either unavailable, or available only in an unsatis- factory form: cut, in the wrong ratio, or lacking English subtitles. And it should be remembered that The Berne Act specifically defines films which are otherwise
unavailable (at least in the US) as public domain works. Of all the films currently acces- sible solely via file-sharing services, Jacques Rivette’s OUT 1 (1971) is for me the most important. OUT 1 (often referred to as Out 1: Noli me tangere, though this subtitle does not appear on the print) ini- tially ran approximately thirteen hours, and was intended to be shown in eight parts. When it be- came clear that the film would not be screened on French tele- vision or released theatrically, Rivette edited a radically differ- ent shorter (255 minutes) version entitled Out 1: Spectre, which opened in Paris during 1974. The original version was screened at a few festivals (sometimes in workprint form, or with parts of
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