Synopsis
Sex, drugs and punk rock. Add violence and time travel and you have Jubilee.
Queen Elizabeth I visits late 1970s England to find a depressing landscape where life has changed since her time.
1978 Directed by Derek Jarman
Queen Elizabeth I visits late 1970s England to find a depressing landscape where life has changed since her time.
Jenny Runacre Nell Campbell Toyah Willcox Pamela Rooke Ian Charleson Karl Johnson Linda Spurrier Jack Birkett Hermine Demoriane Neil Kennedy Adam Ant Richard O'Brien David Brandon Helen Wellington-Lloyd Jayne County Claire Davenport Barney James Donald Dunham Gene October Lindsay Kemp Iris Fry Joyce Windsor Quinn Hawkins Ulla Larson-Styles Howard Malin William Merrow Luciana Martínez Prudence Walters Duggie Fields Show All…
Magnicídio, ジュビリー/聖なる年, Violenza blu, 희년, ジュビリー, 庆典
In 1976, Derek Jarman had this to say about the British punk scene, its prime movers and faithful followers; "petit bourgeois art students, who a few months ago were David Bowie and Bryan Ferry look-alikes – who’ve read a little art history and adopted some Dadaist typography and bad manners, and who are now in the business of reproducing a fake street credibility"
So why did he set about making a film whose aim was to capture the nihilist aesthetic of punk?
Well, primarily because he had become fascinated with Jordan, whom he first spotted at Victoria Station and recorded in his diary thus; " "White patent boots clattering down the platform, transparent plastic miniskirt revealing a hazy pudenda. Venus…
“The world's your oyster, so swallow it."
Derek Jarman’s satirical take on the hypocrisies of England’s punk subculture is undeniably messy, but it’s full of remarkable concepts and fascinating imagery. Jubilee follows Queen Elizabeth I as she gazes into the dystopian future of the country in a state of lawless disarray of violence and depravity, and laments over what went wrong. I love the idea, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t get dull pretty fast; trudging along so slowly for a film set around anarchy that it feels tedious and counterproductive. There’s still plenty to appreciate about it though; fun, exaggerated characters, arresting costuming and set design, and some cool music sequences. It’s far from being perfect in any way but it definitely stands out, and Jarman’s ambition is really commendable.
It's kind of a shame that all the big name punks attached to this dropped out when they felt it would be a slam on the scene, but on the plus side Jarman ended up with such a wild assortment of second-stringers who, if anything, actually give the movie greater punk credibility. Jordan, after all, was pioneering the fashion back when it was liable to get her attacked, and seeing The Slits as a vicious girl gang is worth all the Clash footage in the world.
Like the other great punk movie, Dennis Hopper's OUT OF THE BLUE, JUBILEE isn't really a punk document so much as an impression of the scene and an attempt to follow its image out…
This film is like a real life depiction of a New York club that Stefon tells you about during SNLs weekend update:
NYs hottest new club is called SCUM! Located in nihilist Britain of the 1970s, this bar has everything: Queen Elizabeth I, two bisexual incestuous brothers, group sex with Jesus, asphyxiation, musical numbers, disembowelment... if you’re into post modern anarchy with hints of pastoral homages to Shakespeare, this is the spot for you!
I’ve feel like I’ve seen so many comically masculine punk movies at this point that it’s kinda nice to finally see one that uses Jayne County, Siouxsie, and the Slits as its cultural markers, not the Pistols. Kind of remarkable!
adam ant in jubilee (1978) i’m free on thursday which is a day that i’m not doing anything that is thursday i am free on thursday
Consumerist monopolies, apocalypto-punkish kink-harborers, fascist ACAB depictions, double reflexive obloquies, primitive ladslang, rampant poverty, pollution and salaciousness, forward-thinking queer and sociopolitical commentary, girlboss masochists dishing out brutal justice and entropic bedlam in equal measure, Brian fucking Eno…
Derek Jarman wasn’t simply a filmmaker, he was a subversively sibylline prophet.
"As long as the music's loud enough, we won't hear the world falling apart!"
Mini-Collab w/ Rob
While watching Jubilee, I found myself thinking about a conversation that I had with my brother yesterday about a movie we both love, The Birdcage, which was considered (and probably still is) polarizing because not everyone enjoys flamboyance. Luckily that's never been a problem for me; give me more of what I want to enjoy, not less. So of course I can fuck with Derek Jarman's outrageously anticarpediurnal vision of the UK descending into camp-punk anarchy!
What would Queen Elizabeth I (Jenny Runacre, who does double duty by also embodying a modern-day rebel) do if she were transported into the most broken and…