The controversial film, which is vying for Best Live Action Short at the 91st Academy Awards, revolves around the 1993 murder of James Bulger by Jon Venables and Robert Thompson.
- Jan 26, 2019
AceShowbiz - The director of a controversial new movie about a headline-grabbing British child murder is refusing to withdraw the project from the Oscars.
Tragic James Bulger's mother Denise Fergus has asked Irish filmmaker Vincent Lambe to pull "Detainment", which is a contender in the Best Live Action Short category, from contention at the Academy Awards next month (February 2019), but he has refused.
"It's like saying we should burn every copy of it," he tells the BBC. "I think it would defeat the purpose of making the film."
The short is based on the transcripts of police interviews with Bulger's young killers, Jon Venables and Robert Thompson, who tortured and killed the two-year-old after luring him away from a shopping centre in 1993.
"Detainment" follows the events surrounding the murder and is comprised of re-enactments based on the transcripts.
Defending his controversial film, Lambe adds, "The public opinion at the moment now is that those two boys were simply evil and anybody who says anything different or gives an alternate reason as to why they did it, or tries to understand why they did it, they get criticised for it. I think we have the responsibility to try and make sense of what happened."
Fergus and her husband Stuart appeared on TV in Britain on Thursday, January 24 and appealed to the director to withdraw his film from the Oscars.
"Vincent was nothing to do (with the case), why does he have a responsibility to make the film? He was 12 years old when it happened," Denise said. "If you go on social media, that's all he's talking about, trying to get himself out there, putting himself forward for the Oscar.
"We're actually saying to Vincent Lambe now, because he's put himself forward for the Oscar, withdraw that yourself and remove your film from the public domain."
She added, "Seeing the images of actors playing James, it's just horrendous. I just can't get that image out of my head of him being led away."
