One of the problems with contemporary documentaries that profile an idiosyncratic or iconoclastic figure is that they are too often conservative and straightforward in their approach. Wild men like Hunter Thompson (Gonzo) and Charles Bukowski (Born into This) deserve movies that are creative, not PBS specials. Barney Rosset, while not as legendary as those two men, was just as rebellious and probably more influential. With Obscene, he is also the latest victim of the well-behaved, adoring documentary treatment, which seeks not so much to capture the subject as turn him or her into a museum piece.
Though not a household name, any person who cares about literature should be familiar with Rosset. For several decades, Rosset was the publisher of New York City’s Grove Press and its spin-off magazine, the Evergreen Review. Called everything from a “smut peddler” to a “the last maverick in American publishing,” Rosset was responsible for publishing such luminaries as Samuel Beckett, Allen Ginsberg, Malcolm X, Tom Stoppard and Jean Genet, as well as distributing the famous Swedish sex film, I am Curious (Yellow).
As the title indicates, Obscene takes particular interest in the controversial works released by Grove and their subsequent court battles and tribulations, which included then Senator Gerald Ford’s denunciation of the Evergreen Review. Rosset, as much as anybody in American letters, helped to redefine the boundaries of what was acceptable, publishing such milestones of “obscenity” as D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer (a favorite of Rosset’s), and William S. Burroughs’s groundbreaking Naked Lunch.
Rosset appears in both contemporary interviews and older footage, including a spot from a late night show with the combative publisher of Screw, Al Goldstein. Despite how his critics might like to portray him, Rosset emerges as soft-spoken, dignified, and articulate. He’s a much more appealing first amendment star than say, Larry Flynt. At the same time, he can also come across as a little too quiet and self-effacing, less fascinating that the books he was associated with. He’s even said, “If you want to know the person I am, look at the books I publish.”
And you wish the filmmakers spent more time with the books and with what made them important, aside from their offensiveness. Obscene has no shortage of self-satisfied talking heads from the ’60s telling you how great the counterculture was, such as an obnoxious Ray Manzarek and author/artist Betty Dodson, who brags about how she threw the best orgies in NYC. What the film fails to do is present a greater cultural, literary, or intellectual context for their hero. For example, it would be illuminating if there were someone explaining what was so radical about Burroughs, apart from his explicit content. There’s, ultimately less time spent on the content of the books and more on their notoriety.
Obscene is earnest, fitfully interesting, and proud of its liberal credentials. It’s not that they lack material, as the story of Grove is as colorful as its authors, including the bombing of its offices, protests by radical feminists, and an eventual sideline in Victorian erotica. Directors Neil Ortenberg and Daniel O’Connor, however, are perfectly content to employ de rigueur documentary devices like montages, use of historical footage, interviews with famous people (Gore Vidal, John Waters, Jim Carroll), and somewhat obvious choices of music (Dylan, Doors, Patti Smith). It’s not a bad film, but it feels like a missed opportunity that gives Rosset more credit for defending freedom of speech than for publishing some of the 20th century’s most distinctive authors. You might just be better off reading one of Grove’s books.
by Lukas Sherman
