Liberty… Privacy… A Fair Trial... Freedom of Speech... Prohibition from Torture…
Think you know your rights? Think again.
The shocking truth about how our fundamental personal freedoms have been gradually eroded by Tony Blair’s government will be revealed this summer in TAKING LIBERTIES – an explosive film released in cinemas by Revolver Entertainment on 8th June.
TAKING LIBERTIES uncovers the stories the government don’t want you to hear – so ridiculous you will laugh, so ultimately terrifying you will want to take action. Grannies arrested under the Serious Organised Crime Act; young sisters detained for 36 hours for a peaceful protest; an RAF war veteran arrested for wearing an ‘Bollocks to Blair’ T-shirt. Ordinary law-abiding citizens being punished for exercising their ‘rights’ – rights that have been fought for over centuries, and which seem to have been extinguished in a decade.
Irreverent but revelatory, outrageous but true, TAKING LIBERTIES combines these real stories of liberty loss with never-seen-before footage, cheeky stunts and comment from leading politicians, celebrities, human rights organisations, academics and lawyers. Narration from Ashley Jensen (EXTRAS, UGLY BETTY); a soundtrack featuring Oasis, Franz Ferdinand and Radiohead; and the input of Kurt Engfehr, co-producer of FAHRENHEIT 9/11 add up to make TAKING LIBERTIES the most important and controversial film to hit screens this summer.
- Interviews available with contributors and interviewees
- Film clips and book extracts available for viewing
- Taking Liberties the book will be released 25th May by Revolver Entertainment
For further information, interviews or to be informed of press screenings please contact Lyndsey Honour and Hannah Wilkinson at Revolver Entertainment, 020 7243 4300 lyndsey@revolvergroup.com, hannah@revolvergroup.com
Please note as TAKING LIBERTIES is still in post-production screenings of the film will take place from beginning May 2007 – film clips and books extracts available before this date.
DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT
I want to achieve only two things in this documentary: To make people laugh, and to make them angry. Politics is never usually a subject to exact either of these responses, but Tony Blair has given us everything you could want for a jaw dropping and hilarious film.
Taking Liberties tells the story of how, over the last ten years, a group of sharp suited PR Men and management consultants called New Labour have stolen the rights and freedoms of the British People. This story is not told by celebrities or politicians, but by ordinary people whose lives have been turned upside down by injustice. What is probably most fascinating is to see how these people – whether they have been arrested for a peaceful protest or tortured in Guantanamo Bay –have reacted to their injustices in startling and uplifting ways.
This is not a film about left and right - Liberty is apolitical. We have deliberately looked for the widest range of opinion possible, and the message we have heard from every corner of Britain has been the same: The past 10 years is an unprecedented shift of power away from the individual towards the state. New Laws have been passed that have restricted our freedom in ways that were not even considered in wartime.
Our leaders are now at least being open about this - in the summer of 2006 John Reid announced: “Sometimes we may have to modify some of our freedoms in order to prevent their misuse”. I still don’t know if he’s aware that he was actually paraphrasing Hitler. In order to distract us from this liberty heist we have to be sold the myth that terrorism is an entirely new phenomenon, and our leaders can supposedly only crush this threat by taking away our ancient freedoms. While Tony Blair has been the ringleader in this power grab, his successors are just as keen to increase state control even further. Even if you buy the fact that New Labour have dismantled our freedoms out of a genuine desire to protect us, they have left the door open for a less savoury leader to eradicate British Democracy.
Easy as it is to blame Blair for all of this, we must take some of the responsibility for letting this robbery to happen under our noses. We have been told that we must lay down our freedoms for our lives. I prefer to remember those people in past generations who laid down their lives for our freedoms.
However it’s not all doom and gloom – the sheer absurdity of the bewildering array of idiotic new laws have given us an abundance of bizarre and hilarious situations for our documentary. We should really thank Tony Blair and New Labour for providing us with more than enough surreal and absurd moments.
This journey has involved meeting hundreds of people, getting arrested, being laughed at, being hugged, being punched, being physically sick from talking to torture victims, and worst of all, meeting Geoff Hoon. Everyone who has been involved in Taking Liberties has been seriously emotionally affected by the experience – I hope for the better.
If there’s one thing I’ve learnt from making this film, is the understanding that politics is not about self important windbags in Westminster, or thundering newspaper editorials – it’s about people. And all people need to do is to engage and have a voice and they can change the world.
Chris Atkins
TAKING LIBERTIES – THE CONTRIBUTORS
The following are contributors to Taking Liberties, interviews available on request.
Henry Porter: author, journalist and UK editor of Vanity Fair
Mark Thomas: comedian and campaigner
Michael Mansfield: Top human rights QC
Eric Metcalfe: Human Rights Policy Director for ‘Justice’
Clare Short: recently resigned from the Cabinet, Labour party member for 30 years
Crispin Black: Ex MI5 agent
Shami Chakrabati: Head of Liberty
Kate Allen: Director of Amnesty International
Andrew Gilligan: journalist, resigned over Hutton Report
Philippe Sands: QC Matrix Chambers
Max Hastings: former editor of the Telegraph and Evening Standard
Boris Johnson: conservative MP
Professor John Tullock: 7/7 survivor and expert in media manipulation
Baroness Ludford: Lib Dem MEP involved in extraordinary rendition enquiries
Andy Hayman: Chief Commissioner at the Met Police for terrorism
Phil Booth: IT database systems expert previously employed on government projects
Lord Philips of Sudbury: Liberal Democrat peer and lawyer
Tony Benn: Ex cabinet minister and president of Stop the War Coalition
Martin Bell: former MP and journalist
Ken Clarke: Former Home Secretary, Tory MP
SO YOU THINK YOU’RE FREE..?
TAKING LIBERTIES features astounding true stories from the British public – people of all ages, classes, walks of life, religions & political standpoints who believed they had the right to basic freedoms. Interviews available with featured interviewees, including:
Maya Evans and Milan Rai
Evans and Rai were the first people to be arrested under the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act. Their ‘Serious Organised Crime’? Reading the names of dead Iraqi civilians and dead British soldiers at the Cenotaph in Whitehall.
David Bermingham and The Natwest 3
David Bermingham, one of the so-called Natwest 3, has been extradited to America for a supposed crime committed on British soil. David, his wife Emma and his parents give exclusive access to their story
Rose and Ellen Pickford
Rose and Ellen Pickford are young sisters who were locked up for 36 hours, alone, following a peaceful demonstration, whilst armed police raided their home in the middle of night.
They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.
Benjamin Franklin
Mouloud Sohali
Acquitted in the so-called ‘Ricin plot’ case, Mouloud Sohali is now under house arrest in North London, electronically tagged and under a strict 18-hour curfew. He’s regularly visited by the jurors who found him innocent, who are also interviewed in the film.
Rachel North
A survivor of July 7th bombings, North opposes the ‘anti-terror’ laws and is campaigning for a public enquiry into the London Bombings.
Omar Deghayes
Deghayes, a British resident from Libya, has been detained and tortured at Guantanamo Bay for the last five years – and is still there. His sister Amani speaks about his treatment and experience.
We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office
Aesop
John Catt
Catt is an RAF veteran arrested under The Terrorism Act…for wearing an anti-Blair T-shirt
Moazzam Begg
Released from Guantanamo Bay after being held there and at Bagram, tortured and imprisoned without charge, for 3 years, Begg now campaigns against ‘anti-terror’ laws
Walter Wolfgang
An 82-year old CND vice-president and Labour party member, Wolfgang was manhandled out of the Labour Party Conference in 2005 for shouting ‘nonsense’ at Jack Straw – and, upon trying to get back in, was arrested under the Terrorism Act.
CHRIS ATKINS – DIRECTOR
As the long time collaborator of writer/ director Richard Jobson, Chris co-produced Jobson’s debut feature, Sixteen Years Of Alcohol, which was screened in competition in many festivals including Edinburgh & Toronto, and won awards at Dinard and the British Independent Film Awards. It also was given 5 star reviews on it’s theatrical release in 2004.
Following the critical success of Sixteen Years, the pair teamed up again to make the UK’s first kung fu movie, The Purifiers. The UK rights were acquired by Working Title was released in the US by New Line.
In 2002 Chris wrote & directed the micro budget dark comedy Feedback on which premiered in Edinburgh in 2004 and was screened in competition at the Raindance Film Festival in 2005.
Following this, he produced Jobson’s third film A Woman In Winter. This was a romantic ghost story set in the world of Quantum Physics, so Chris’ physics degree came in surprisingly useful. The film premiered at the London Film Festival in November 2005 and was nominated for a Scottish BAFTA for Best Film.
He became interested in all things to do with liberty at the end of 2005 and hasn’t slept since. He has resigned himself to never travelling to America again.
KURT ENGFEHR – CO-PRODUCER
Kurt has worked in all areas of television and film production. During stints at HBO, MSNBC and National Video Center, he edited TV shows, music videos and documentaries. He has also been a promo writer for ABC and HBO. Kurt then worked on Michael Moore's Emmy nominated show THE AWFUL TRUTH (1999), where he was Senior Editor.
Kurt has recently won the American Cinema Editors award for best documentary editing for his work on BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE (2002), which he also co-produced. Not being able to pry himself away from bowling, Kurt then worked on A LEAGUE OF ORDINARY GENTLEMEN (2004), a documentary about life on the pro bowling circuit which won the Audience Award at the 2004 SXSW Film Festival. Kurt followed that up by working on Michael Moore's last film, FAHRENHEIT 9/11 (2004) where he was once again, co-producer and editor.
Kurt then worked on SEAMLESS a movie about NY fashion directed by Doug Keeve, who previously made, UNZIPPED. Kurt is currently co-producer and editor for the documentary TRUMBO based on the off-broadway play about Dalton Trumbo which uses his letters as the basis for telling the story of his being one of the blacklisted writers in Hollywood during the 1950’s. Kurt is also finishing up editing a documentary with Angelina Jolie, called either THE JOURNEY IN or A MOMENT IN THE WORLD. He is also producing a doc about the selling of beauty. Called AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL it’s getting a great reception on the festival circuit. Kurt is also producing a documentary about the band Manic Street Preachers, who Rolling Stone magazine called, the best band you’ve never heard of.
NICKY MOSS – CO-PRODUCER
Nicky is an experienced, hands-on producer with success in commercials, drama and documentary.
Nicky began her career at the Notion Picture Company in Sydney, making broadcast documentaries. In the UK Nicky went straight into features as Production Manager on the acclaimed drama The Great Ecstasy of Robert Carmichael. The film went on to be the only British film selected for Cannes in 2005 and competed in the prestigious Critis’s Week category. It premiered in the UK at the Edinburgh Film Festival and was theatrically released in October 2006. It has also enjoyed a successful European cinema release through the Wild Bunch.
After the comedy Too Much Too Young for Pensmith, Nicky went on to A Woman in Winter where she established her producing partnership with Chris Atkins. She then worked with Chris on Nina’s Heavenly Delights. Earlier this year Nicky co-produced the horror film Reverb with Swipe Films and EMI Music. She has also produced several commercials with recent campaigns for Carling and French Connection.