On the Panoptical and Starred Up

David Mackenzie’s Starred Up is a fierce prison film, calling to mind Un prophete (2009), an addition to the prison genre that will become a classic of the canon. And, like Un prophete, Mackenzie’s film shows you don’t need to sacrifice style to tell a hard hitting, intelligent story.

More than being a narrative that asks the nature versus nurture question, Starred Up offers a fascinating insight into the institution, perhaps best explored through Bentham’s architectural guard, the Panopticon, a tower designed to give the impression of all round surveillance. From the moment Mackenzie’s protagonist, Eric enters the prison, the institution takes over; stand here, move there, take this off, wear this, turn right. The monotony of the quick orders, reminding Eric he is now one of many, ends with him being placed in a cell, viewed from a narrow slot in the door; to be seen without knowing or seeing back. Eric is initially wrapped within the panoptical.

Mackenzie often films the prison (which the film never leaves) with low angle shots looking up through the middle, or the opposite, offering us views of all the floors and the mesh like steel that divides them. Designed for all inmates to be observed by prison guards. After Mackenzie defines the institution he spends the rest of the film having Eric try to break it. This middle section of the film, developing the role of Eric’s father, a leader of the prison, raises the nature versus nurture question, especially as we never see Eric as a free man. Here Eric begins to uncover the immorality of the prison, seeing the institution for the flawed establishment that it is. Eric and his small group of friends (found in therapy he is initially reluctant to attend) become the pan doing the observing.

Mackenzie’s film is not a criticism of Bentham’s theory, but instead a film that offers no easy solutions on guilty and not guilty (Rupert Friend’s Oliver comes closest to such a category, but is removed before the dénouement). The idea of therapy is offered as a preferred alternative to the institutional routine, but even this Mackenzie shows to be impractical against a prison hierarchy who ‘see all’. Starred Up is not an easy watch and raises difficult questions, but deserves to be seen, by all.