Babylon

A brilliant and important film that for many years since its 1980 release has languished, little-seen until the last decade. Babylon fleshes out the experiences of inner-city black Britons, the joyous release of sound systems, and the deep British racism that landed hard from several sources. Inspired by the great producer Dennis Bovell’s wrongful imprisonment, the story sees Brixton dub reggae DJ Blue pursue his art while struggling against the prejudice of neighbours, National Front, police and his employer. Few films were ever this good at depicting black life in Thatcher’s Britain. Screening with the UK premiere of the Jamaican short Flight.

…films like this can stand the test of time. They aren’t dramatizations. This is how it was and is, and director Franco Rosso understood the experience. But as [he was also] an actor, he most importantly allowed actors and non-actors to be themselves. There was nothing to tell us what and how something should be. We all experienced the issues these characters dealt with as far as covert and overt racism. You could say, we were mostly acting as ourselves. It was just real. I still have people who quote lines to me from the movie, because it’s just everyday life. It’s our life all the time.

Actor Brinsley Forde, from a 2019 interview with VICE