User Reviews

I was mistakenly sent this, and figured I'd give it a watch to see what it was about.

A man with a knife on a toddler is shot in the face by a policeman. Terry Rosland threatens to blow himself up in his car if he can't see his family - and he nearly does (the car is toast); he later commits suicide by drugs. Protesters in South Korea throw firebombs and shoot flamethrowers at construction workers. In El Salvador police fire at veterans holding hostages. A truck with a stolen lawnmower is struck by a big rig during a police chase. In Utah, police gun down a man who opens fire on them after he exits his car following a chase. The same happens in California, the twists being that he has no pants and loads his rifle from his trunk while police watch, and commits suicide. Why didn't police tackle him before he loaded it? In Spain, a bull strips a man's pants and underwear off to the cheers of the crowd. Another bull is stabbed by the crowd, who surround the ring behind a metal fence. They then intentionally release it into the city streets! It gores one man and nearly kills a woman. Apart from the cruelty to animals, talk about your Darwin Awards candidates! Students are attacked by a shark. An elephant attacks its trainer and another man at a circus, then others while it escapes, fired on by police, and ultimately killed by them. Elephants are notoriously mistreated. Shades of Electrocuting an Elephant (1903). Plus ça change. In a Floridian strip club, some apparently real sex occurs. Probably not the safest sex! In Vegas, a corrupt cop is caught bargaining with a prostitute and actually receives a BJ in footage that is partly censored, contrary to the video box's claim. She apparently is allowed to leave. A 2 Live Crew concert results in public indecency charges because of some wet rump shaking in g-strings, where one of the rappers pulls the string aside. At another, audience members engage in an onstage orgy. At both, the music is shut off by someone. In Chile, Deep Purple fans overburden a light tower, which collapses and sparks. In Australia a cameraman is struck by a 280Z during a road rally. In Florida, a series of stock car crashes eventually hit a paramedic. A storm in Poland topples a chimney on a crowd, killing a woman. In Chechnya, two Muslim rapists are publicly executed by relatives of the victim. In Brazil, shoppers are shot, and the robbers then shot by police, who then decide to execute one of them. In New Mexico, a hot air balloon flies into power lines; it catches fire and the basket plummets. In Brazil, police beat a captive, and on another occasion beat two men at a checkpoint and then shoot at their car. In Russia, thugs beat a businessman; police only belatedly stop them when they begin choking him with a wire. At a Californian pool hall, gangs fight, one man being shot to death after being beaten. At a Floridian drug dealer's home, some intruders commit murders. In Guatemala, rapist/murders are publicly executed, over objections by the Pope (who had no problem with the ones in Chechnya?). In Mexico, a rapist/murder suspect is beaten and set on fire by vigilantes. In Illinois, a crowd ignores the bells at a train station, and the last of them crossing gets hit and thrown at the camera by a train.

This lacks any credits, beyond captions identifying the location of footage. There are previews from Banned from Television II and III afterwards.

What does this video say about the world? It's a cruel place, that humans make crueler, perhaps. That people can be incredibly stupid, or morbidly curious. "Here it is again, in slow motion"

Banned from Television is a narrated collection of wildly variable in quality clips culled from news reports, amateur home video footage & police tapes that depict some of the more gruesome incidents shot. It's the sort of footage that, you know, would be banned from television!

From police chases that end in tragedy (a man speeding on a motorcycle slamming into a bus) to tragic stunts gone wrong (a daredevil motorbike jump that goes wrong & the rider misses the ramp) to sporting catastrophes (rally cars ploughing into spectators) to undercover sex tapes (a police detective getting a blow job from a prostitute in exchange for letting her go) to executions (rapists killed by firing squads) to accidents (an impatient woman hit by a speeding train) to tragic human suffering (a woman has her leg bitten off in a Shark attack) to suicide (a depressed Japanese man shoots himself) to police taking out criminals (a robber holding a woman at gunpoint is shot in the face by marksmen) to CCTV footage (convience store workers being attacked & shot dead by thieves) to the odd funny moment (a guy swearing at a policeman for giving him a speeding fine) this is nothing more than 110 minutes of real life tragedy edited together. Personally I thought it was watchable if you have a certain morbid & ghoulish fascination but a lot of the footage isn't that graphic, it goes on for too long in the sense that there's a lot of 'before' & 'after' the event footage present & a lot of it is repeated in slow motion which doesn't help the often abysmal quality.

Banned here in the UK by the BBFC, their justification for the ban was because the footage was presented as entertainment, I quote from the website 'there is no attempt to justify the images by placing the incidents in any other journalistic or educational context. Whatever current relevance the images might have had when they were originally photographed has been lost in the general compilation of horrors'. Well, that's crap because there is narration all the way through this which clearly indicates the context of the original footage & often whether people survived or died & a little bit of background is given too so their argument there doesn't hold up. Anyway, not that it matters since Banned from television is easily enough found if you want to see it.

Banned from Television is a rather tamer Faces of Death (1978) style shockumentary that also resembles Terrorists, Killers and Middle East Wakos (in fact some of the same footage is used in both), those with the stomach & a morbid curiosity might want to check this out & it has it's moments for sure but it's nothing special & does tend to drag with all the excess footage & slow-motion replays. Followed by two sequels, Banned from Television II (1998) & Banned from Television III (1998).

I've seen many of these shocking videos. It bothers me, but sometimes it is so incredible that I want to keep watching. There's a breed of us out there. The best ones are narrated- as is this one. And it's not all death. Where as "Faces of Death" and it's spin offs are people who die brutally on tape. "Banned from television" has a similar edge but is a tad more mild. Most of it is people who barely survive or easily survive something very dangerous. Possibly a spoiler: At the end of this video is a woman who gets hit by a train. It is the most gruesome image I have ever seen! A woman who has a name, -most likely- hopes for the future, plans for the holidays, a family at home, etc. She was in a hurry but I wonder why she didn't stop. Even from a normal cam corder recording, one can hear the train coming here. Even though her view was obstructed, she should have had better patience. (She couldn't wait for that train to just pass now could she). It is very sad. Life is fragile. Look both ways. And if you screen this, don't say you weren't warned.