This Is Cinema Clash

He’s chronicled punk in film for more than 25 years, but now JULIEN TEMPLE has turned from the filth and fury of the Sex Pistols to the life story of his close friend JOE STRUMMER. Simon McKay talked to him about capturing the Clash frontman’s complexities.

Julien Temple passed a rehearsal studio in 1976 and was lured in by the sound of the Sex Pistols rehearsing. He was drawn to punk immediately and began filming the Pistols and The Clash that year. True to the spirit of the movement, he proceeded to write and direct the ‘fantasy’ story of portrayed in The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle (1980). Remarkably, this also served as his final year film-school project. Since then, Julien’s filmmaking career has continued with a heavy music bias. He has enjoyed a free hand directing pop promo videos for artists of the stature of Bowie and the Stones and in 1986 made the feature film Absolute Beginners. However, he has continually returned to making punk documentaries; in 2000, there was a second Sex Pistols documentary, The Filth & The Fury. His latest, Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten is set for release this month.

Julien introduced a recent screening of The Future Is Unwritten by saying that Joe had led “one of the best lives you could hope to make a film about”. He later explained to Record Collector what it was that wanted to capture in the film.

“The contradictions, there were so many in his life: the public school, …

by Simon McKay
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