After premiering at Cannes in 1980, Franco Rosso’s Babylon was suppressed both in its native England and abroad for fear that it would inflame racial tensions, a fate that resulted in decades of obscurity. But over the years this reggae-fueled drama has won its share of ardent fans, and a recent, long-overdue theatrical release in the U.S. has put it back in the spotlight.

From ‘This is Ska’ to ‘Babylon’ — these are the films that helped shape the reggae genre.

Franco Rosso’s reggae sound system film Babylon will be streaming exclusively in North America on TIDAL for the month of June. We caught up with the film’s lead actor, reggae legend Brinsley Forde, to chat about his role in the movie, which tells the tale of a young reggae DJ in late ’70s London named Blue and his Ital Lion sound system crew. Ital Lion are locked in a battle against rival crews — and against the racism inherent in their city.

The film is coming exclusively to TIDAL in June.

Late director Franco Rosso’s Babylon screened to a sold out, standing-room-only crowd at Brooklyn’s BAM — its first-ever U.S. release a mere 40 years after it was made. The excitement of the eclectic crowd was undeniable. Everyone was on the edge of their seats: from young dancehall heads, to septuagenarian types who might’ve seen Bob Marley at his first show in New York, to British expatriates from Brixton, the London neighborhood where the movie takes place.

A Jamaican son of “Saturday Night Fever,” director Franco Rosso’s electrifying “Babylon” is having its extremely belated American theatrical release both 39 years late and depressingly right on time.

A poignant, unflinching slice of British-Jamaican street life, Franco Rosso’s “Babylon” premiered at Cannes in 1980, but was never released in the U.S. and received an X-rating in the U.K. for being too controversial.

Acclaimed 1980 film ‘Babylon’ about London’s reggae scene gets U.S. release

Retro delights on tap, including Dr. Ruth and 8-track tapes, plus French hustlers, a Merce Cunningham tribute, and more in cinemas this week.

Babylon. Franco Rosso’s 1980 drama, which rarely screens in the U.S., exposes the trials and tribulations of black youth in early-1980s London, as seen through the eyes of a reggae sound system’s front man (Brinsley Forde).

Racism against young black men is a distressingly familiar issue in the U.S., but it’s an international problem and has been for years, as “Babylon” shows.