“It’s like watching paint dry,” a line commonly found in reviews of excessively lengthy and boring movies, is wholly applicable to Charlie Lyne’s unique protest against the British Board of Film Certification. The freelance journalist and filmmaker forced the BBFC to sit through Paint Drying, in which nothing more happens than white paint drying on a wall for a little over 10 hours. The 607-minute film has been awarded a U certificate, which qualifies it for distribution.
Lyne made Paint Drying to protest against two related problems faced by independent filmmakers: a movie cannot be shown in cinemas in the United Kingdom without BBFC classification, and filmmakers must pay the BBFC high fees to get their productions rated. The BBFC is immensely more liberal than the Indian Central Board of Film Certification, byt Lyne claims that the insistence on classification prevents independent directors from getting their films into cinemas. The BBFC charges a submission fee of £101.50 as well as £7.09 per minute. Lyne managed to pay for his 10 hours of footage by starting a crowdfunding campaign Make the Censors Watch 'Paint Drying', in November, through which he raised £5,963, which was enough to submit 607 minutes of footage.
The BBFC rose up the challenge, assigning two examiners to watch Paint Drying over the course of January 25 and 26. The examiners were not “phased” at watching hours and hours of a blank white wall, a spokesperson said.
Lyne has made a bigger splash with Paint Drying than with all his previous films, which include Beyond Clueless (2014), about movies featuring teenagers, and the short Copycat (2015).
The issues raised by Lyne are equally applicable in India, where no film can be released without the CBFC’s approval. Unlike the BBFC, on which it is modelled, the CBFC is far more enthusiastic about censorship, demanding cuts and bleeps even with adult-rated films and sometimes denying certificates at will.
If Lyne were to subject the CBFC to his protest, he would likely have been turned away for the same reason as artist-turned-director Babu Eeshwar Prasad’s Gali Beeja. In 2015, Prasad was denied a certificate by the Bengaluru office of the CBFC for his arthouse debut feature on the ground that the film “did not make sense”. Prasad was recently granted a certificate after a long wait.
