Videos

Born Free

• 14th May 2010

Full frontal nudity, sexual acts, drug use, IRA references – 'Born Free' ticks all the boxes. At almost nine minutes in length, it continues in the vein of the increasingly popular mini-movie music video. However, this one doesn't allude to a lesbian love affair with Beyonce or burger product placement – so if that's what you're looking for, you might be advised to give this one a miss.

M.I.A., never one to shy away from controversial issues, addresses many of them here – genocide, racism, inhumane warfare. Aside from a couple of the more graphic scenes, there's nothing on show here that isn't readily viewable in any action film – or the news for that matter. In fact, people watching the video might well be more offended by the sex scenes involving an older, average-bodied couple than they are by the violence.

In what's quickly become the most talked about sequence, director Romain Gavrais explores one of the last screen taboos – infanticide. In a scene that would finally push Scott Tenorman over the edge, we witness the killing of a young boy due to a close-range shot to the head. It's arguable that people find this scene so offensive because it's the splattering of a cute ginger-haired kid's brains we get to witness.

Is ethnic cleansing suddenly a step too far when Western cuteness is added to the mix? It's all too easy to ignore the fact that it happens regularly in other parts of the world – we just don't get to see it.

Upon thinking her own record company had censored the video, M.I.A. took to her Twitter account to vent her anger: “FUCK UMG WHO WONT SHOW IT ON YOUTUBE!” She quickly posted another message stating that it wasn't actually UMG's fault. In fact, even YouTube itself hadn't removed the video but merely 'hidden' it behind an age-restricted click-through.

In a recent NME interview, M.I.A. (real name Maya Arulpragasm) herself admitted that she finds the new Justin Bieber video more of an aesthetic assault than her own handiwork. I'm inclined to agree.

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