Wildmon Widens Case Against ‘Damned’ : Law: The fundamentalist steps up his efforts to stop screenings of a film about arts censorship.

The Rev. Donald Wildmon has filed court documents in Mississippi that broaden and intensify his campaign to block the screening of an award-winning British documentary about arts censorship in the United States.

With a $2-million lawsuit already pending against producers of the film “Damned in the USA,” the Tupelo, Miss., fundamentalist has filed a petition seeking to include as additional defendants in his suit the British television network that commissioned the film and the network’s American distributor. Wildmon also is asking the court to approve new amendments to his suit that would allow him to claim additional punitive damages of $5 million and to seek a permanent injunction preventing the documentary from ever being shown without his permission.

Wildmon must get court approval to make amendments to his original lawsuit because he has passed the deadline to make out-of-hand changes.

The new court petition, received this week by the New York attorneys representing the filmmakers, follows earlier moves by Wildmon to broaden the case. Since filing his lawsuit last fall, Wildmon also has taken legal action compelling officials from the Museum of Natural History in New York and Webster University in St. Louis to give depositions about the circumstances surrounding screenings of the film at their institutions.

“Damned in the USA” was shown at the New York museum’s Margaret Mead Film Festival in September, and went on to win an International Emmy Award in New York two months later. The film was then screened at Webster University last month as part of a retrospective of the films and photographs of British filmmaker Paul Yule, who produced the documentary.

Sherri Felt-Dratfield, one of the attorneys representing the filmmakers, said that efforts by Wildmon and his American Family Assn. to prolong and expand the court battle “fits right into their agenda to prevent this film from seeing the light of day.”

The conservative group fights what it views as indecency and anti-Christian material in the media. Much of “Damned” is devoted to interviews with Wildmon, who explains his philosophy and tactics and takes the filmmakers on a driving tour of his home city of Tupelo. Although he agreed to the interviews, Wildmon claims that the producers had signed contracts prohibiting them from showing the film in the United States. They deny the claim.

“I’m amazed,” said producer Yule. “We certainly don’t believe he has any such right to do this.”

With his new petition, Wildmon appears to be seeking a worldwide ban on the film. The court papers, filed March 6, cite numerous foreign screenings as violating the contractual agreement with him. On his list are screenings that took place at the Edinburgh Film Festival, Rotterdam Film Festival, Cork Film Festival, Amsterdam Film Festival and the Chicago Film Festival, where it was presented to judges and won a Silver Plaque.

Besides examining Wildmon’s role in arts censorship, the film also looks at topics such as the controversy surrounding Andres Serrano’s photograph “Piss Christ,” the obscenity trial resulting from the Contemporary Arts Center of Cincinnati’s showing of the “Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment” traveling exhibition, the arrest of rappers 2 Live Crew and the efforts of U.S. politicians to influence the awarding of National Endowment for the Arts grants.

The film shows many of the controversial works, including the Mapplethorpe photographs with their graphic homosexual and autoerotic themes.

Issues depicted in the film were revived recently when Republican presidential candidate Patrick Buchanan accused President Bush of allowing the NEA to fund pornographic works. NEA chief John E. Frohnmayer subsequently resigned in what some Washington observers said was an attempt by the Bush Administration to appease conservative voters.

It is not known whether Wildmon plans additional legal action against the Museum of Natural History, Webster University or anyone else, Felt-Dratfield said.

The lawsuit, and the possibility of additional legal measures against potential exhibitors, has virtually frozen attempts to show the film publicly in the United States, despite interest from other universities, art movie houses and PBS, say the films’ attorneys and producers.

“Now, with new defendants, they could prolong the litigation by months,” Felt-Dratfield said.

“Damned in the USA” was first shown on the British network Channel 4 last April as part of a special series of programs that were about censorship or had, themselves, been censored.

Wildmon originally filed a $2-million suit against Yule, the film’s producer, his production company Berwick Universal Pictures, the American co-producer Jonathan Stack and his company Uptown Media Associates.

He’s now seeking to add as defendants Channel 4 International, the network’s sales arm and Devilliers Donegan, the company that distributes Channel 4 programs in the United States.