Masculinity in Scum (A.

Clarke, 1977, UK),

by Cina Aissa
(cinnaramone@yahoo.co.uk)

The 70’s were a complex time in British history, a time of heightened anxiety about

the future. The euphoria of the 60’s had worn off, the economic crisis was looming and

unemployment was rife. The entry to the EEC in 1973 divided opinions and the country was

shaken by waves of strikes, from the Upper Clyde shipbuilders to miners and public services

during the ‘Winter of discontent’ of 1978-79. The arrival of Margaret Thatcher in power in

1979 was to greatly shape the future of Britain in all areas. Social unrest was seen on the

television screens not only in the news where there was much talk of trade-unionism but also

in social problems films . Alan Clarke, a television director famous for his ‘plays for today’

had had his televised play version of Scum (A.Clarke, 1977, UK) banned for being too crude

but remade it and saw it released in cinemas in 1979.

In this essay we will look at representations of gender in Scum (A. Clarke, 1979, UK) and the

messages they present.

The film opens on the official transfer of three adolescents: Carlin (Ray Winstone) ,

Davis (Julian Firth) and Angel (Alrick Riley), to the borstal. It is unclear what they have done

but they are greeted by an atmosphere of minimal words, except for the shouted instructions

from aggressive wardens who tell the boys that they are now numbers. Soon after the boys

arrive, each one of them gets bullied by the established bully of the borstal, a situation to

which the wardens turn an amused blind eye. Carlin is beaten up by the ‘Daddy’ and his

acolytes one night but is sent to solitary when he refuses to tell the wardens what happened

and continues to claim that he fell down the stairs. Tables are turned though when Carlin
comes out and takes his revenge, becoming ‘the daddy’. Carlin finds himself entrusted with

the overlook of the boys and given privileges by the housemaster and his subalterns. But

some of the boys struggle with this new life of brutality, hard labour and constant abuse.

Angel receives a letter telling him that his wife called Candy had died and when he goes to

the matron for support, she assumes that Candy is the name of a pet. He slashes his wrists at

the borstal and is transferred to Wormwood Scrubs where he ends his life. But when Davis,

one of the smaller boys is raped by 3 older boys in the green house and kills himself, the

inmates fall silent and refuse to eat their food in solidarity. One of the wardens turn to Carlin

to take leadership to bring the boys to eat their food but Carlin throws his plate to the wall

and starts a riot alongside Archer and the other boys in the refectory. The film ends with

Carlin and Archer are seen dragged by guards in bloodied faces and clothes into confinement

cells.

In this coming-of-age “prison [drama]” (Lay, 2002: 84), the borstal is presented as a special

school where the boys will learn quickly to take their place in the world and stick to it. Like

in a “[school movie, it focuses] on the cultural implications of the “construction of

masculinity” in an enclosed community of adolescents” (Leach, 2004: 186). It follows the

principle of the ‘short, sharp, shock’, an ideology of strong punishment for any type of crime

that will provide a lesson that will stay with the boys for life and put off those who might

want to get involved in crime. The borstal presents the boys with a “social order based on a

clearly defined class hierarchy” (Leach 2004: 197) that needs to be adhered to from the start.

At the top of the ladder, the ‘Governor’, an older man with an obvious background in the

military forces, to whom ‘reports’ are passed about the rebellious elements of the borstal.

Very much like in court, (or in front of God Almighty) each boy who needs to be redressed is
brought in front of him with 2 wardens (like archangels) standing between the ‘Governor’

and the boy.

A penalty is imposed on the boy by the ‘Governor’ to which the wardens add a loss of

‘privileges’ depending on their dislike for the boy. The housemaster is a presence in the

background of the borstal, he manages the wardens and does not get his hands dirty. Under

him, the wardens are brutal and perverted, turning a blind eye to all types of ‘inmate on

inmate’ abuse. The wardens enjoy being in charge of the boys and taking care of those who

do not walk straight. They obey blindly to their superiors but seethe with hatred for their

subaltern condition and aspire to the cold and calculated masculinity of the ‘Governor’ and

the housemaster.

Very much like the adults’ model, the boys have also got a hierarchy starting with the

interchangeable ‘Daddy’. Being the ‘Daddy’ means dominating others, hitting the hardest and

being ruthless. When Carlin (Ray Winstone) takes over as the ‘Daddy’, on top of his instant

unchallenged status, he also obtains certain privileges for being in charge of the boys and

steering them towards submission to authority. Under the ‘Daddy’ are all the other boys and

at the bottom of the pile are ‘the black bastards’.

Within this hierarchy, differences are still perceptible even though they are aimed at

being phased out. Archer (Mick Ford), the oldest of the boys, a long-haired intellectual,

calmly resists the system with his literary puns and his vegetarianism.

He is a loner who aims to prove that ‘the bastards can’t get [him]’, for example when he write

‘I AM HAPPY’ on the newly painted wall. He refuses to wear shoes as an assertion of his

refusal to walk the same way as everybody else. He is misunderstood by all and offends a

friendlier warden when he challenges him to vent his aggressivity on the real oppressors (his

superiors) instead of taking his anger on the boys .

 Carlin, also, is a new type of ‘Daddy”. He is a working class anti-hero, who has got a

fair side to himself and an openness of mind that enable him to converse with Archer.

But Carlin is still keen to assert his authority as the ‘Daddy’, hitting those who won’t comply

and calling others ‘black bastards’. In Scum (A.Clarke, 1977, UK), it is not clear who the

word ‘scum’ really refers to, the boys or adults of the borstal but it is likely to refer to the

warden who police the place.

The borstal, with its ‘one model fits all approach’ is indeed a redemptive institution

that seeks to change the boys and turn them into men. It is also an analogy of the family circle

where boys are given an education through discipline. “The family is to varying degrees

replaced by the institutional juvenile care system” (Lay, 2002: 84). Like in all traditional

families, women are there in the background. They “play a marginal role […] but are

important as figures against whom the masculine code can be defined” (Leach, 2004: 186).

One of the boys is allowed out for a night to quickly get married to a girl he has impregnated.

There is hope of a possible salvation through marriage and fatherhood for him. The only

woman in the borstal, the matron, lacks feelings and tact when she assumes casually that

Candy is the name of a pet (it is instead the name of Angel’s dead wife). Other women in the

background are a cause for heartache: Angel (Alrick Riley) slashes his wrists when he hears

that his wife has died. He is transferred to Wormwood Scrubs but kills himself there. Another

boy is told to forget about his ‘pups’ and ‘toughen up’(paraphrased from the film) when his

mother writes to him about the puppies back home. By extension, men who are too close to

women disqualify themselves for masculinity or end up used as a woman. Both happen to

poor Davis (Julian Firth), the smallest of the boys, who kills himself when he is raped in the

greenhouse by three older boys (under the perverted eye of a warden in the distance). Davis

prefers to kill himself than being used as a woman for his smallness and fragility. Masculinity

is seen a test of one’s strength and absence of feelings.

At the end of Scum (A. Clarke, 1979), both Carlin and Archer opt out of the cold and strong

masculinity on offer when they unite through their struggle against the unfair system.

If the borstal is redemptive, Carlin and Archer end up in hell for rejecting and denouncing the

hypocrisy of a dog-eat-dog system. Their bloodied faces assure us that they will be oppressed

until they submit to the oppressing regime of the borstal and by extension, to society out

there. Carlin, the working class boy with a conscience and a good sense of right and wrong

and the educated Archer also show that workers and intellectuals should unite as they are

both victims of the repressive system.

At a time when politicians wished to reaffirm the national boundaries and suggest a “backlash

against the “liberation” politics of the 1960’s and the consequent loss of respect for

traditional values” (Leach 2004: 197), Alan Clarke’s Scum (A. Clarke, 1979) provided a

critical snapshot into the individual as raised by the nation. At the turn of the decade and

with the millennium in the horizon, Clarke shows us that nobody can remain

human when they are raised by the Motherland/ Fatherland. Indeed, the self-contained

family model of the borstal cannot produce well- adjusted men until the system is rendered

fair and some appropriate role-models are provided.

Bibliography:

Lay, S., British Social Realism: From Documentary to Brit Grit, London: Wallflower, 2002

Leach, J., British Film, Cambridge, CUP, 2004.

Websites

Both accessed on 23/03/2010:

http://www.britishtelevisiondrama.org.uk/playfortoday/alan-clarke/#identifier_1_139
http://www.bfi.org.uk/live/video/149