Although the movie, The Da Vinci Code, based on Dan Brown’s best selling novel, has had a fair share of negative criticism from both film critics and religious circles, it had only been banned from showing in a handful of regions like Pakistan and Fiji. I can name more than a handful of film critics who would want to have it banned in the U.S. as well, but what people want is more important than what critics say anyhow.
A BBC news article discussing Chinese distributors discontinuing the movie in theaters (here), hints to whether this move was really in order to allow theater time for newly released Chinese films, or a masked attempt to late hour censorship. Apparently Da Vinci’s “code” has been too popular among Chinese Christians. If I was in the shoes of the Chinese censor (scrap that thought) I wouldn’t see that as reason enough to ban the film. If I didn’t want people to be religious, a film which western Christian churches claim to be “sacrilegious” and “offensive to the faith”, would in no way bother me.
If you ask me, I think this was just a move to shift the flow of Yuan into indigenous pockets rather than those of the American studios and producers. Anyhow, I’m sure (just hearsay really) people have been buying the pirated DVD on the streets there since the first day it opened. Contemptible and illegal as piracy may be, it could perhaps also be considered a way of making “banned” material available to the oppressed film-buffs of the world.
