Now into its second year and ninth release, the BFI's Flipside DVD series uncovers many “lost” films from the archives: these might not quite be the Best of British, but they're certainly some of the most unique, with no two Flipside releases ever the same.
First up for this quarter is director Peter Watkins' 1967 look at the music industry, Privilege. Starring one time Manfred Mann lead singer (and future Radio 2 DJ) Peter Jones alongside Sixties supermodel Jean Shrimpotn, Privilege was the first film to use the “mockumentary” style of film making made famous by The Rutles and Spinal Tap.
Jones is teen heartthrob Steve Shorter, a singer who's career had been shaped by the British government of the day as they try to teach the teenage population how to behave. Shorter may start off the rebel but with his mentors' help he'll be formed into something more palatable, his fans hopefully following suit.
Shorter's dalliance with Vanessa (Jean Shrimpton), a girl who sees through the facade, leads him to question his career, something his puppet masters cannot allow to happen if the nation's youth is to be tamed.
Coming at a time when Beatlemania had stormed the global charts and obsession with glamour and fame was at a peak, Privilege was well placed to comment on the way music is cynically tailored to meet the needs of predetermined demographics. Watkins succeeds in showing us a scarily clinical and precise world where real talent is created by focus group, Jones' dawning realisation that something isn't right portrayed with chilling precision.
With 2010 seeing us wallow in here-today-gone-tomorrow musical acts voted for on carefully scripted “reality” shows adored by the masses, the cynical among us might wonder if Watkins' message fell on somewhat deaf ears.
A mass of DVD extra features, something typical of the Flipside range, accompanies the main feature, with Watkins' 1969 short The Diary of an Unknown Soldier and 1961's The Forgotten Faces also available with a content-rich booklet.
Also hailing from the 1960s is Gerry O'Hara's That Kind of Girl, a film which begins as your average, potentially-titillating, au pair sex comedy but which soon spins off into an educational drama on the dangers of STDs.
Margaret Rose Keil stars as Eva, the blonde bombshell nanny whose dalliances with numerous men has the unwanted effect of spreading VD between them and their partners, leading to despair, lectures from a very serious doctor and the potential death of Eva's young ward.
Story-wise the film meanders a bit between each new encounter, but O'Hara keeps everything moving at a decent pace, the camera clearly in love with Keil.
The film's need to preach at its audience might now be more funny than shocking, but there's something about the interaction between the cast and the snapshot on early-60s Britain which gives the film an historical bent which is fascinating. More short films and a booklet complement the package.
Finally we dip a toe into the 1970s for Lindsey Shonteff's Permissive, a glimpse at the heady lifestyle of the rock groupie as they follow their heroes around England and wait for them backstage and in grubby hotel rooms.
Arriving in the only-just-still-swinging London of 1970, Suzy (Maggie Stride) goes to friend Fiona (Gay Singleton) for shelter, only to find herself in the middle of the world of the groupie. Fiona is sleeping with a band member and it's not long before Suzy falls into the same way of life, her senses dulled by drink, drugs and the need for somewhere to live.
Shonteff piles on the tragedy for Suzy, her innocent ways soon forgotten as potential boyfriends dump her or die tragically while she begins to gain a reputation in the band as someone who'll sleep with anyone.
The decision to flashforward to the deaths of various members of the band was certainly an interesting one, though it's debatable whether the audience would have thought there was ever going to be a happy ending after the glum first hour or so.
The perfect complement to this month's other releases, music and sex permeating all three, Suzy's fall from naïve fan to unthinking object of desire is one worth watching.
The booklet this time around features contributions from some of the real-life band members who took part in the film while 68-minute feature Bread, a different take on the same subject from 1971, is a welcome extra.