OK City Police Round Up Copies of ‘Obscene’ Movie ‘Tin Drum’

Civil rights activists called for a federal investigation Thursday after police seized copies of the Oscar-winning movie “Tin Drum” from six video stores--and at least one home--because a judge had declared the film obscene.

“This kind of insensitive disregard of our fundamental rights of expression and free speech is outrageous,” said Joann Bell, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma.

Bell said the ACLU “received several complaints from citizens whose homes were violated without a search warrant last evening as the police went to private homes to confiscate copies of this video.”

The local video chains made their rental records available to police, who then went to the homes of those who had rented “Tin Drum,” Bell said.

“We are meeting with cooperating attorneys and expect to seek a federal review of the police’s conduct,” she said.

Police said they took a copy of the film from only one home, that of Michael Canfield, an ACLU official.

“Tin Drum,” the 1979 Academy Award winner for best foreign film, is German director Volker Schlondorff’s acclaimed adaptation of Gunter Grass’ novel about Nazi Germany as seen through a young boy’s eyes. It includes one scene where a boy about 6 or 7 has oral sex in a bathhouse with a teen-age girl.

On Wednesday, District Judge Richard Freeman said the movie was obscene under Oklahoma law, which defines obscenity as any depiction of a person under 18, or anyone portraying someone under 18, having sex.

“Frankly, as long as the statute is the way it is, I couldn’t do anything else,” the judge said.

Freeman responded to a complaint by Oklahomans for Children and Families, an anti-pornography group upset that the film was available at a public library.

Oklahoma City police Capt. Bill Citty said two vice officers seized copies of the film from five Blockbuster Video Stores, one Hollywood Video store and one person’s home after the judge’s ruling. He didn’t specify how many copies were confiscated.

Bell likened the police action to “book burnings organized by Hitler’s Gestapo.”

Oklahoma County Dist. Atty. Bob Macy said he will not prosecute anyone who rented the film Wednesday or earlier, but he will press charges against anyone found with the film from now on.