Scrubbers

United Kingdom, 1982

Film
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Swedish director Mai Zetterling filmed this tense and realistic drama set in Borstal Women’s Goal using a cast of mostly unknown young actors. The film powerfully portrays the dehumanising experiences the mostly young offenders undergo in prison but it does so without resorting to exploitation of the women or a glorification of violence. Instead Zetterling focuses on the friendships formed by the women within prison. “Scrubbers” is unavoidably confronting and disturbing - but it is also a prison film with a refreshing sense of dignity.

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Collection

In ACMI's collection

Credits

director

Mai Zetterling

producer

Don Boyd

production company

HandMade Films

Duration

01:33:00:00

Production places
United Kingdom
Production dates
1982

Collection metadata

ACMI Identifier

302845

Language

English

Audience classification

R (18+)

Sound/audio

Sound

Colour

Colour

Holdings

VHS; Access Print (Section 1)

Wikidata

Q7439322

Please note: this archive is an ongoing body of work. Sometimes the credit information (director, year etc) isn’t available so these fields may be left blank; we are progressively filling these in with further research.

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If you would like to cite this item, please use the following template: {{cite web |url=https://acmi.net.au/works/81728--scrubbers/ |title=Scrubbers |author=Australian Centre for the Moving Image |access-date=2 November 2024 |publisher=Australian Centre for the Moving Image}}