Derek Jarman

A retelling of the life of the celebrated 17th-century Baroque painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio through his brilliant, nearly blasphemous paintings and his flirtations with the underworld.

Against a plain, unchanging blue screen, a densely interwoven soundtrack of voices, sound effects and music attempt to convey a portrait of Derek Jarman's experiences with AIDS, both literally and allegorically, together with an exploration of the meanings associated with the colour blue.

A collage of Derek Jarman's super 8 footage spanning over 20 years.

Documentary about British artist Andrew Logan as he attempts to put on the 2009 edition of his Alternative Miss World. The film also presents a history of the contest (which has run eccentrically since 1972) which was set up firstly as an excuse to have a good party, but has grown into a celebration of alternative lifestyles and sexualities. The documentary mixes archive footage, animated inserts, with talking head interviews and a fly-on-the-wall look at the organisation of the 2009 event

An illegal psychic teleportation experiment goes horribly wrong, and pretentious promo director Patrick gets his genes mixed with those of a football hooligan. Slowly, he begins to change - taking on some undeniably yobbish tendencies.

In 70s Great Britain, a gay teacher is forced to hide his sexuality by day while living his secret life by night.

Untitled (For Derek Jarman)

In this short film written and directed by Alexis Bisticas, the audience sees through the eyes of a man in the woods, following the distant sound of a saxophone. In a single take, the fluid steadicam shot takes the viewer on a surreal and poetic journey, as the walker comes across everything from family picnics to men in bondage suits.

Ostia is a fascinating short film directed by Julian Cole and produced for the Royal College of Art, which reconstructs the events leading up to the murder of Pier Paolo Pasolini. Ostia relocates the proceedings to London and stars Derek Jarman as Pasolini. The film features an evocative dream sequence which is accompanied by poignant excerpts from Pasolini’s own poetry, as read by Jarman.

In this revealing documentary, Ken McMullen creates an elegant portrait of artist and filmmaker Derek Jarman, based on an interview conducted by John Cartwright. The questions are unobtrusive, allowing Jarman to reflect on his major films. Despite the debilitating effects of serious illness, we see an artist with his inner vision unimpaired; still humorous, self effacing and disarmingly charming.

Documentary presenting Alan Parker’s view of British cinema with comments from Richard Lester and others and location report from King’s Lynn on the making of Hugh Hudson’s Revolution, starring Al Pacino, Donald Sutherland, and Nastassja Kinski.

Derek Jarman discusses his film and visual art work in this experimental conversation film.

Derek Jarman died after 19012 days from his birth. I wish I was able to see, and let people see, through the eyes of someone who is not there, through the memories of his life. - DP

A young man enters a psychosexual nightmare after his cat dies.

Experimental short film

When the young, attractive Joe Orton meets the older, more introverted Kenneth Halliwell at drama school, he befriends the kindred spirit and they start an affair. As Orton becomes more comfortable with his sexuality and starts to find success with his writing, Halliwell becomes increasingly alienated and jealous, ultimately tapping into a dangerous rage.

A nearly wordless visual narrative intercuts two main stories and a couple of minor ones. A woman, perhaps the Madonna, brings forth her baby to a crowd of intrusive paparazzi; she tries to flee them. Two men who are lovers marry and are arrested by the powers that be. The men are mocked and pilloried, tarred, feathered, and beaten. Loose in this contemporary world of electrical-power transmission lines is also Jesus. The elements, particularly fire and water, content with political power, which is intolerant and murderous.

A shadowy, sharply-dressed spokesman for the occult, chaos-magic fellowship and network The Temple of Psychic Youth reads a brief message.

Derek, in chronological order, records the work and life that stands at the foot of Derek Jarman's humour and spirit of being an artist. The filmmaker and actress, Isaac Julien and Tilda Swinton respectively, have produced and narrated a film on his life whereby the use of language is perpetuated to give some type of palpable meaning to British audiences alone, and to their own personal relationship with him.

Cinématon is a 156-hour long experimental film by French director Gérard Courant. It was the longest film ever released until 2011. Composed over 36 years from 1978 until 2006, it consists of a series of over 2,821 silent vignettes (cinématons), each 3 minutes and 25 seconds long, of various celebrities, artists, journalists and friends of the director, each doing whatever they want for the allotted time. Subjects of the film include directors Barbet Schroeder, Nagisa Oshima, Volker Schlöndorff, Ken Loach, Benjamin Cuq, Youssef Chahine, Wim Wenders, Joseph Losey, Jean-Luc Godard, Samuel Fuller and Terry Gilliam, chess grandmaster Joël Lautier, and actors Roberto Benigni, Stéphane Audran, Julie Delpy and Lesley Chatterley. Gilliam is featured eating a 100-franc note, while Fuller smokes a cigar. Courant's favourite subject was a 7-month-old baby. The film was screened in its then-entirety in Avignon in November 2009 and was screened in Redondo Beach, CA on April 9, 2010.

The artist's personal commentary on the decline of his country in a language closer to poetry than prose. A dark meditation on London under Thatcher.

The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence are an order of gay male 'nuns', founded in San Francisco in the late 1970s with a goal to "expiate all stigmatic guilt and promulgate universal joy". There are now thousands of nuns all over the world including 30 in Britain, some of whom we meet in Tom Stephan's short documentary, which follows the Sisters' work as active campaigners in the LGBT community.

Documentary exploring the life and work of artist, Derek Jarman.

A documentary that collects for the first time and in an almost anthological way the historical repertoire of the Lindsay Kemp Company's shows, from the end of the 70s to the 90s. With footage from the Rai Teche and private archives, and an intimate and touching unpublished interview conducted by the director in her home in Livorno. The documentary is unique in its kind because it collects for the first time in an almost anthological way the repertoire of the shows of the glorious Lindsay Kemp Company from Salome to Flowers, from A Midsummer Night's Dream to Duende and Onnagata, up to the last show Kemp Dances. Lindsay Dances celebrates one of the most original, creative, and innovative artists in contemporary dance theatre. The documentary was nominated by Rai for the 72nd edition of the Prix Italia 2020.

In the early 1980s, Jarman struggled to get feature film projects off the ground and invested his energies in different fields, including music videos. In 1984 he made the promo for ‘What Presence?!’ by Scottish post-punk band Orange Juice, as fronted by Edwyn Collins. Before the official shoot, however, he visited the location and made this tape, trying out shots with a newly acquired Olympus VHS camera. The warm colours and fuzzy softness of the format, plus the decision to shoot handheld, imbue this little-known, rarely seen artefact with a palpable directness.

Clause and Effect is a tape that combines documentary footage with positive images of gay men and lesbians to show the impact of Clause 28 of the Local Government Bill both on them and the wider community. The tape is framed by an exclusive interview with Derek Jarman who talks about the origins of the Clause, ‘its roots in the moral majority and their interpretations of the Bible’, the effect that it will have on the community and on his work as a film maker.

Super 8 footage shot on location in Sardinia in 1975.

A BBC Arena profile of the Director from the time of the release of his film, The Garden, featuring interviews with Jarman, his collaborators and friends.

Reel 11 of Gérard Courant's on-going Cinematon series.

A studio discussion which looks at the push for gay marriage, or domestic partnership laws, in Britain, the USA, and Denmark. Would such laws be a truly radical initiative, or a complete sellout to the notion of equality with heterosexuals?

Cinématon n°105 : Derek Jarman

An ode to Derek Jarman, who, while grappling with death and the loss of his sight, began to see the world through a blue-tinted haze, a reflection of his struggle and medication. This is his Blue.

Several guests who are lesbian or gay go to a home for Christmas.

A series which looks at the diversity of gay life through a mixture of documentary, drama, music and comedy.

The Comic Strip is a group of British comedians, who came to prominence in the 1980s. They are known for their television series The Comic Strip Presents... which was labelled as an example of alternative comedy. The core members are Adrian Edmondson, Dawn French, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer, Peter Richardson, Jennifer Saunders and Alexei Sayle with frequent appearances by Keith Allen, Robbie Coltrane and others.

Personal reflections on the best of 20th Century architecture.