Warning over 'violent' stunts video

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Sick stunts in a new breed of videos have prompted unprecedented warnings that viewers could kill themsees if they tried to copy them.

For the first time censors have insisted that a new "reality" format, in which amateurs are filmed taking part in Fight Club-style acts, must carry on-screen and verbal cautions.

The Backyard Wrestling films - released in the UK for the first time on Monday - feature people jumping off roofs, hitting each other with golf clubs and falling on to barbed wire fences and flames.

During the first 65-minute film, The Best of Backyard Wrestling, there are repeated scenes of leaping from great heights on to the stomachs of others.

Backyard Wrestling is already cult viewing in many countries. UK distributor of the US-made films, Revolver Entertainment, plans to release nine volumes over the coming months.

There are three written warnings and a spoken caution before the action - which is staged but meant to look real - even begins.

A spokeswoman for the British Board of Film Classification said: "This is the first time we have asked for these warnings. They can be seen as encouraging people to do extremely stupid things. We have to be sure we've done all we can to ensure nobody comes to any harm as a result of watching these scenes."

The BBFC spokeswoman said: "We said that they had to have written and verbal warnings. Some viewers of this sort of thing will be vulnerable members of society who may need a spoken warning in addition to what is written on the screen.

"This whole genre of reality stunts is a new phenomenon and not something we have had to deal with before."

Backyard Wrestling follows the success of the MTV series Jackass, which has also spawned a movie.
 
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