ALLISON PEARSON: Holy cretins, Batman, this is no family film

Tag : Brad Point Bits

Horrifying? You bet. But, believe me, that counts as a quiet,reflective moment in a symphony of sadism.
And who can see this film? Anybody can. The Dark Knight isclassified as a 12A. That means a child of any age can see it solong as they're accompanied by an adult. For crying out loud - and I certainly did a couple of times during this film - howcould such a remorselessly brutal movie get a family-friendlyrating?
It's the job of the British Board of Film Classification to protectaudiences from grossly unsuitable material. Yet in its advice toconsumers, the board says The Dark Knight 'contains moderateviolence and sustained threat'.
Holy critical cretins, Batman! If this is moderate violence, whatthe hell does the extreme kind look like?
Any board which can deem this film suitable viewing for childrenlacks the moral faculties to be any kind of judge at all.

The BBFC is, in effect, conspiring with a Hollywood system thatspends millions of advertising dollars to pull in an audience for afilm that is simply too young to see its horrors, let alone revelin them.
In 2005, when the guidelines for the 12A classification werereviewed, Sir Quentin Thomas, the president of the BBFC, said: 'Theprotection of children remains at the heart of the guidelines.'

Knife victim: Brooke Kinsella and friend at the scene of herbrother's murder in Islington, North London
Having seen The Dark Knight, I simply don't believe him.

Consider this. If Batman had climbed out of bed and walked acrossthe room to find his rubber boxers, thus showing his Batbum, thefilm would have been rated a 15 - nudity being deemed far moreshocking than cutting people's throats, obviously.
Personally, I would be far happier for my children to glimpseBatman's buttocks than to see a pencil skewered into a man's eye,but what do I know? I'm just a mother.
To complain about violence in film these days is to mark yourselfout as a sad old spoilsport who is hopelessly out of touch withwhat children are watching.
Then again, maybe it's parents who are dodging the responsibility,not wanting to seem like spoilsports and letting younger siblingsplay with their brother's forbidden video games.

We avert our eyes from the problem, just as I couldn't bring myselfto watch the Joker and his knife.

Yes, The Dark Knight is an exhilarating ride for those with thestomach for it; but the vision it presents is for adults only. Andeven that is made dangerously stylish and seductive.
The day I went to see the film, I happened to drive past the spotwhere 16-year-old Ben Kinsella was stabbed 11 times. He was the21st teenager to die of knife wounds in London this year.

His killers may have thought they were some kind of cartoon mastersof the universe, meting out a perverse justice, but the scruffystreet corner with its altar of rotting bouquets tells a differentstory.
No stirring music bestowed a thrilling poetic grandeur on Ben'slast seconds. No giant shadow of a cape flitted across the sky.Nobody could save him. Especially not this Batman.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Don't let the snakes poison a true paradise
At Easter last year, my family was taking a sunset boat trip pastthe Cocos Resort in Antigua where Catherine Mullany was tragicallyshot dead.

The bungalows where Catherine and her new husband, Ben, werehoneymooning are like birds' nests perched on outcrops of thehillside, and looked meltingly romantic.
A 31-year-old doctor, Catherine came from a part of Wales just afew miles from where I grew up, so I have some idea how she musthave felt looking out at that stupendous view.
Thankful, no doubt, for the good fortune that had enabled a girlfrom an ordinary farming family to stay in such a ravishinglybeautiful place with the man she loved.
A profound sense of physical wellbeing that comes from having thatheat on your skin all day. Even the rain, if it rains, is nothinglike Swansea rain. Catherine and Ben must have been so happy there.
But now, in the rush to find explanations for this senselessmurder, Antigua stands accused of being a nest of violentcriminals.

Like any poor place visited by well-off Westerners, the island hasits tensions.
But it's not nearly as bad as Jamaica, or many other touristdestinations under the threat of terrorism.

It's certainly a whole lot safer than the mean streets of SouthLondon. Visiting Antigua for the Cricket World Cup, we strolled thestreets of the capital, St Johns, where stallholders gave my sonand daughter fruit and cake, expecting nothing in return.

The local church was packed on Easter Day. I know the good peopleattending that service will be devastated to think that Catherineand Ben suffered so much on their island.
At least we can be sure that justice will be swift - not leastbecause the place depends on British tourists for its survival.

I know that's no consolation right now for the family and friendsof Catherine Mullany.
But I feel sure that this decent, sensible woman wouldn't want theisland where she was briefly so happy to suffer.
I will certainly go back to Antigua, and I hope others will too.The few snakes have no right to poison Paradise.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- At war with my tribe

As credit-crunched families try to escape the gloom of BrownBritain, there is an enemy out there who can spoil any hope ofholiday relaxation.

I refer to the fearsome 'Idonwunna' tribe.

Members of this tribe are easily recognised. What they lack instature they make up for in volume and native cunning.

In hundreds of resorts, mature British adults are to be foundpatiently trying to negotiate with these tiny savages, offeringthem gaudy trinkets and tasty morsels in return for an hour on thesunlounger with the latest Marian Keyes novel:

'You can't go in the pool until you put sun cream on.'

'I donwunna put sun cream on. I hate suncream.'
'If you don't put some suncream on, you will have to stay in theroom.'
'I donwunna stay in the room.'
'Fine,' you say, all sweetness and self-control. 'If you do as Iask, we can go to the beach after lunch!'
'I donwunna go to the beach. I wunna go to the pool.'
If the infant Idonwunnas act like they rule the roost, that'sprobably because they do.
On holiday in Greece last week with friends - like us, also verytired parents of young kids - we pondered a great mystery: Whendid adults start having to do what their children told them?
I could put down the Mojito, get my backside off the sunlounger andwrite a book on this mysterious decline in parental control. Butyou know what? I donwunna.
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A miscalculation
It's like an episode of Midsomer Murders. Suddenly the genteel calmof Channel 4's Countdown is ruptured by greed and backstabbing.Carol Vorderman has quit the teatime quiz show after refusing thechance to take a 90 per cent pay cut.

An offer that even those of us less arithmetically gifted thanCarol could tell was not a promotion. Over the past 26 years, wehave watched Carol evolve from nerdy chipmunk with tragic Eighties'George Michael perm to glossy Detox Queen with a bestselling rangeof audio-visual maths aids.

Critics may say that Carol's habit of dressing like Liz Hurley'spushy older sister might have been more than dear old Countdowncould bear.
Counted out: Carol Vorderman has left Countdown


Others point out that her