A new documentary film, Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché, clears up some of the mystery around the remarkable biracial woman born Marian Elliott. The film, directed by Paul Sng and Celeste Bell, Poly’s daughter, is also a welcome reminder of the power of X Ray Spex and London punk scene to shape cultural conversations. It arrives soon after the appearance of Dayglo: The Poly Styrene Story, co-authored by Bell and Zoë Howe. Neither portrait flinches from the darker aspects of Poly Styrene’s struggles with mental illness, racism and sexism, or her finding refuge as a Hare Krishna devotee. Richie Unterberger spoke with Howe about Poly Styrene for PKM.
Reviews From SFFILM 2021 by Peter Wong on April 13, 2021
The documentary “Radiograph Of A Family” may primarily be filmmaker Firouzeh Khosrovani’s account of her parents’ marriage. But it also manages to be an affecting metaphorical mid-20th century history of Iran’s two major cultural strands without being cloying or blatantly obvious.
The film’s narration begins with the quietly odd statement “Mother married Father’s photograph.” Why the marriage happened that way, the viewer learns, comes from the circumstances of Hossein, Khosrovani’s father. His radiology studies in Geneva, Switzerland were so intense that a request to take time off to get married was pretty much a non-starter.