Influenced by American films and early French fantasists, he drifted between art, exploitation, and pornography.
In their press release, IOCOSE states, "the chain involved practices that are quite common nowadays in the production of art: exploitation and outsourcing, exchanges of files and money transactions, sharing of skills and copyrighting.
"I wanted to explore that middle ground between art and exploitation," Mr. Bate said.
Filming people with learning disabilities presents particular problems; the line between art and exploitation can be fuzzy.
As a result, the slender border between art and exploitation is quickly destroyed, and when the two women begin their violent spree, the cheap-looking splatter of viscera distracts the audience with its cheesy violence.
But at what point does art become exploitation of tragedy for personal gain?
Although seemingly at odds with each other, art and exploitation films are frequently treated as equal and interchangeable in cult fandom, listed alongside each other and described in similar terms: their ability to provoke a response.
Mr. Caine is one of the few reasons to sit through "Harry Brown," an exercise in art-house exploitation directed by Daniel Barber and tarted up with self-importance and a generally striking visual design.
Like many contemporary genre flicks, the new movie features a hyperactive visual style that owes its tricks and tics, smeared images and staccato cuts to art-house exploitation like "City of God" and latter-day Tony Scott, but without the commensurate technical finesse.
The film, which heads to American theaters later this year (via Miramax), was directed by Fernando Meirelles, who shook up screens in 2002 with "City of God," an art-house exploitation film with lots of bullets and not enough brains, and then went higher-brow with an adaptation of John le Carré's "Constant Gardener".
The otherworldly Fauvist palette, as well as the interludes of frenetic cutting, at times recall the Brazilian art-house exploitation flick "City of God," though Mr. Macdonald, who has a background in documentary, proves somewhat savvier about the politics of representation.
