Punk: Attitude

The documentary traces punk back to American bands of the late sixties: the Velvet Underground, the Stooges, MC5, the New York Dolls. From there it moves to the CBGB circle in mid-seventies New York and then to London, taking in the Ramones, Patti Smith, the Sex Pistols and the Clash. The account is not a history lesson; it runs on what the people who were inside those years say about them. The director, Don Letts, came out of the scene himself: he was a DJ at the Roxy in London, was around the Clash and had a hand in the connection made between reggae and punk. That is why the film is not a compilation assembled from outside. Its argument is that punk was an attitude rather than a genre, and that the attitude passed on to later generations, to Sonic Youth and beyond. Jello Biafra, John Cale and John Cooper Clarke are among those interviewed.