Anti-Israeli Loach / Chinese / interference in film festival

Michael Danby, the Federal Member for Melbourne Ports said it is a shame the British film maker Ken Loach has withdrawn from the Melbourne International Film Festival.  Loach demanded the Melbourne film Festival withdraw Israeli films. [The British have never forgotten that they were targeted by Israelis in 1946 during the bombing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem.ED note] Loach’s move follows an earlier move by the Chinese Consulate General demanding the festival not show a film about the Uighurs.

Danby said that Ken Loach’s behaviour towards Israeli films was reminiscent of the Stalinists portrayed in his film about George Orwell and the Spanish Civil War.  Loach sympathetically portrayed the anti-fascist Poum militia, in which George Orwell served and which was destroyed when they were overtaken by the Stalinists.

‘It’s about time that some of these British cultural figures kept their own provincial cultural prejudices at home and stopped  acting like colonial, cultural commissars,’ Danby said.

‘I, like thousands of film goers in Australia, will be very reticent to see Ken Loach films again, knowing that he is so prejudiced that he is opposed to Israel encouraging its own creative film industry. Israelis and Australians have always had a lot in common, including amused contempt for the irritating British penchant for claiming cultural superiority. Melbourne is a very different place to Londonistan,’ Danby said.

‘The age when boring British cultural figures, whether they be Tory or Trotskyite, can give orders to the colonial’s are long gone,’ Danby argued.

Mr Danby said he was not surprised that the Melbourne International Film Festival had ignored Loach’s demand to stop showing Israeli films.

‘Mr Loach should stay home in his grim, cold London garret. He and his prejudices are irrelevant to this part of the world,’ Mr Danby said.

Michael Danby has also opposed the Chinese government’s attempt to impose their beliefs in Australia. He said that Loach’s behaviour was similar to the Chinese Consulate General demanding the Melbourne International Film Festival stop screening film’s critical of the Chinese Government.

Danby concluded, ‘Like many Melbournians, I’ll be attending Israeli films like Waltzing with Bashir and the Uighur film, Ten Conditions of Love. We won’t be giving Mr Loach’s film further thought.’