Business Insider: If you ever question the power of cinema, all you need to do is check out the movies that have been banned in different areas of the world over the past 100-plus years to reaffirm the grip the medium has on people.
Whether it be for political reasons ("The Great Dictator," "Zoolander"), religious reasons ("The Last Temptation of Christ"), or just because of the use of specific colors ("The Simpsons Movie"), all kinds of movies have been blocked from being shown based on some perceived offense
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I think this is my favorite article so far! Wow, what an interesting read. I think we always think of banned movies as a thing from the past, something grandma was too modest to see on the screen. Now, we are in such an age that something as raunchy as 50 Shade of Grey can be shown in film. It was fascinating to find out about movies that you would not typically think of being worthy of banishment. For example, I thought the ban on The Simpsons movie was quite hilarious. Can you really ban a movie because of colors? Can a country really dictate that? I also found it shocking, or not so shocking, that the Temptation of Christ was banned in (conservative) cities. It seems that church and state are not well separated, that goes for a lot of the other movies as well. It is shocking to see the reasoning behind each movie's ban. Another interesting one was that Finland banned a movie to avoid upsetting a neighboring country. It is astounding the power of movies and writing. Creating an alternate narrative can change people's minds and cause so much change, that it is politically recognized.
Banned books and banned movies always bring me back to the question, how much censorship is appropriate. and I always come up with the same blurry line. To me the rating of a movie is always more appropriate then removing it completely. It should be up to an audience whether they want to participate in an experience. Not the government's on whether the experience should be available at all. I see how in a dictatorship or locations of extreme opinions certain movies wouldn't do well, but in that case its up to the economic restraints to pull a movie out of theaters, not the governments.
Maybe it is just me but I believe that us as a human race are far too sensitive. In general you when you walk in a room, before you even open your mouth you have offended over half of the people in the room. I think that this comes from people’s need to want to protect each other from the dangers of the real world. Do not get me wrong that real world is dangerous and scary, but not everything warrants being protected from reality. I am of the school of thought that people should be able to say whatever they want (with in reason) as long as they are not endangering the safety or comfort of those around them. It does not surprise me that some of these titles have made this list, but what ever happened to creative freedom of speech? Just saying.
I wasn’t surprised as to why many of these movies were banned in certain countries, and I wasn’t at all surprised as to the countries either. I have to say though, at least as a person who has grown up in a country that so boldly upholds freedom of speech as a fundamental human right like the U.S. does, I think that censorship on a very broad and general level is a bad thing. But just because you can say something doesn’t mean you should. If other places in the world have problems that seem oppressive to us, we certainly have the national cultural equivalent of a guy who says everything that pops in their head (just look at our election process). So while most of the movies I recognized on this list I personally enjoyed, and think have something valuable to contribute to a conversation about the topics that it deals with, I think that we should treat the awesome freedom of speech that we have with respect, and understand the consequences of the things that we say.
It's interesting that most of these movies were banned not for religious offenses, but for things as silly as using yellow or red. The concept of banning a movie nowadays is honestly crazy to me, as I could watch literally any movie I wanted to in about 15 minutes if I looked hard enough. To think that movies are still banned in countries to this day is just plain freaky.
The movies about religion I kind of get, I don't agree, but I understand it. If a government really feels a movie will contribute to the degradation of their society, whatever, no one was probably that into it in the first place. The movies with extreme sexual or violent content, as well - while I don't agree they should be banned, that's kind of what an NC17 rating is anyways.
The movies that are banned because they make fun of that country are boring. Get over yourself, country. Learn how to laugh at yourself. America makes tons of movies about how fat and awful we all are - we hate ourselves! You should too.
I always love seeing what things countries have banned, whether it be books or movies. It always provides such interesting insight into the culture to see what is not allowed. The movies mentioned in this article are no exception. Some of the reasons given are somewhat reasonable; the fear of pissing off your powerful neighbor is a pretty strong deterrent from showing a movie. However, some of the reasons are ridiculous, the main example being The Simpsons Movie. I would understand it being banned due to some of the raunchy behavior within the movie, but the use of the colors yellow and red? I think that that is a bit ridiculous. One thing that is interesting is the wide variety of reasons for banning a movie, they were not all religious, as I first would think. Whatever the case, seeing these movies on the list of banned films makes me want to watch them in order to really see what all of the fuss is about.
I am currently taking an elective entitled "Censored Texts" in which we discussed the history of banned books and why they have been banned, as well as where it happens and under what social, political, and historical context. Basically, this article is a conversation I've been having all semester. What I have come to understand is that banning and censorship throughout history is far more than interesting. It is not fascinating or tragic or diabolical or cool, it is no claim to fame and no congratulations, nor is it the opposite. It simply is. It doesn't have to be, but it is. We can sit around and talk about the fact that it happens, but no amount of interest or curiosity is going to change that. What we can do is learn from it. Why does it happen? Who decides that it needs to? What makes a book, movie, play, television show, song, painting, anything so offensive or scary or wrong that one human being makes the decision to take it away from all others? In understanding this, we can begin to understand a bit more about humanity, a bit more about the time and the minds that came before us. And that's all we can really hope for. Curious or not, history is still a tool.
It's interesting to see how some of these were banned for political reasons, while it seems some were banned for pride or fear reasons alone. For instance, Freaks seems to be banned just due to the fact that it's disturbing and maintains a strange cast.
For the movies that were banned it the countries that they satire, or their allies, its clear that they have been effective in satirizing them. The Great Dictator, is an incredible satire in its condemning of Hitler and Nazism. These movies clearly hurt the pride of the countries they satirized, and touched on the nerve that the satires were hoping to touch. For instance Zoolander truly doesn't have a lot to do with Malaysia, mostly its just goofy, but for them to ban it for mention of their prime minister being assassinated is kind of strange. Did they think it would encourage people to want to plot in that way? That's why to me it seems like a hurt pride thing.
In terms of the movies that are just banned for sexual content or violence, movies are just movies. The violence in Texas chainsaw massacre seems to have no real reason to be banned, other than the sheer violence. But what is the use of censoring that? Violent movies are sometimes a good way to indulge in humanities violent tendencies, but in a minimal amount by viewing it only. I'm not sure that Jason from Texas Chainsaw really makes people want to do that, if that's what the government thinks will happen. And the sexual content baffles me. That's what ratings are for. If it's rated X, then kids won't see it. And also, porn exists. i wonder why they want to protect their citizens from explicit content even when that content is easily accessible and already exists.
It's amazing how unexposed to censorship we are in America. I see my peers who also wrote on this article are often shocked at the reasons for banning a movie or how ridiculous it is for a movie to be banned. The reality is that America is unusually uncensored in comparison to many countries around the world. Sure we have the rating system, which is a form of censorship, no doubt. But a child can still go see Deadpool (R) with his parents. We don't have many films in this country that are downright inaccessible to everyone. I remember when I was a kid watching the television go blank during segments of BBC broadcasts. I remember learning "commonly known facts" about Communism and the history of the country that I was living in that I realized upon moving back to the US were just blatant lies. Banning a movie for political reasons, or even the colors they use, is not uncommon or ridiculous. The United States has a really good deal going on. Almost no information is unobtainable. I think we tend to forget that a little too often.
This list was really interesting to read! Some of the films such as “The Interview” or “A Clockwork Orange” make total sense to why they were banned in some countries. On the other hand, I was surprised about a good half of the films that were mentioned. I realized then that I forget a lot of the time that I live in a comparatively free and open country. Many other places around the world have much more censorship of media, and movies or books that we may consider funny and harmless may be seen as anti-government propaganda somewhere else in the world. The movie that caught me off guard the most was Leonardo DiCaprio’s “Wolf of Wall Street”. The article does not give an explanation to why it is banned in a handful of countries, and I am wondering what the reason is. I am interested in watching some of these movies now to see what they are about regarding their reasons for censorship.
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