Ever since its release in 1989, Brian Yuzna’s Society has attracted a lot of attention. It’s a film whose special effects work continues to impress audiences today, and is astounding in light of the tools available at the time. It took on what was then highly controversial subject matter, and its focus on sexuality caused apoplexy in American censors. As such, it has received extensive critical appraisal, but one area which hasn’t really been covered in the past is what it meant to its writer, Zeph E Daniel (then known as Woody Keith) – both as he understood it at the time, and later.

Taking on a lot of difficult issues, The Darkside Of Society is a film which some viewers will find hard to watch, and which one might consider exploitative were it not for Daniel’s evident passion for telling his story and the degree to which documentarian Larry.