Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Cinescape-goat

Poor KNCC, I mean Cinescape.. I would not want to be in their shoes. They go to all the trouble of revamping their brand and fixing up the theatres and they still have to deal with illiterate, reactionary government censors.


The latest? Memoirs of a Geisha has been playing for a while, after getting a pass from the idiot censors, or one of them at least since the others must have been out to lunch. Yesterday they all decided that the Geisha profession is equal to prostitution after receiving an angry letter from one upset citizen (just one!!) and ordered Cinescape to pull the movie from all cinemas without even reviewing it. They completely ignored the fact that the movie goes out of its way to explain that geishas are NOT prostitutes and that they are frequently misunderstood. They didn't even bother asking Cinescape for a clarification.

Meanwhile, Casanova - about the legendary womanizer who smooth-talked countless women into sleeping with him is still showing, though God knows how much the censors hacked off it. Why Cinescape even bothers with movies like this is beyond comprehension.



But do I detect a gender bias here? That it's OK to show movies with men sleeping around but not women? And do the government censors have functioning brains that can even make that distinction or am I giving them too much credit?

I'll wait for the DVDs...

30 comments:

  1. buddy check Nick Does it again

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  2. Sadly, it is gender bias, which tells you something of the MOI minister.

    I guess we have to wait for an angry letter from an upset Kuwaiti women to have 'Casanova' withdrawn from cinemas.

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  3. Shosho... and how do we know the letter sent about Geisha wasn't from a woman?

    Lets keep the minister out of this for now. The culture of illogical and unnecessary censorship as been around much longer than him

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  4. عاداتنا وتقاليدنا...تمنع هالنوع من الأفلام....اشتهوا يستشرفون...ما أدري ليش يت على هذي

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  5. نعود لمسألة المجتمع الذكوري. ما يحق للذكر(في نظرهم) لا يحق للمرأة و إن فعلوا نفس الشئ و في نفس الوقت و في نفس المجتمع. الجيشا حرام لكن كازانوفا حلال. يا أمة ضحكت من جهلها الأمم.
    ملاحظة لزيدون: الجيشا هي عاهرة (بالعربي الفصيح) لكنها كلاس. يعني هي تمارس الجنس لكن مع نخبة المجتمع فقط. و إن فسرت بأي تفسير آخر لكنها تمارس الجنس مقابل مال، أو هدايا، أو معاش مدى الحياة.

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  6. أعتقد المشكلة تتلخص في نقطتين
    الأولى هي مستوى الثقافي و الانفتاح للرقيب الي يقص اللقطات مستوى سيء جدا

    يعني بوسة عالخدحرام بس واحد ساعتين يقول شت و فك و سانافابج

    shit , fuck , sanavabitch

    عادي ما يقصونه

    المشكلة الثانية ان شركة السينما ما فيها ريال يقول كيفنا محنا مقطعين و الي ما يبي يشوف لقطات بوس و تلملم خل يقعد بالبيت أو يروح أفلام المناسبة لسن 12 و بي جي

    شيشتني على فلم جيشا شكلي بروحله بعد شوي لأنه طيارتي بعد ثمان ساعات

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  7. shosho

    Yes, "we have to wait for an angry letter from an upset Kuwaiti women to have 'Casanova' withdrawn from cinemas."

    This is not mainly gender bias or anything related to religion.

    It is WEAK-KNEED KUWAITI BUREAUCRACY that causes such things. The MOI censors or anyone of their bosses may be afraid to look bad in the Minister eyes and may cause him embarrassment. That would mean possible re-assignment away from the department.

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  8. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  9. see Geisha

    Geisha vs prostitute anology is interesting.

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  10. Moody... that's the same link in my post, which Dooda did not bother to click

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  11. May be the public do not like the far eastern sensuous look :p

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  12. قرأت الموضوع عبر الرابط يا زيدون و خلاصته هي...
    the true intimate role of the geisha remains the object of much speculation, and often misinterpretation, in Japan as well as abroad.

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  13. بالضبط يا دودة... محور الفيلم هو سوء فهم المجتمع لهذه المهنة

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  14. zaydoun , we agree sometimes , and disagree sometimes

    yes i agree censoring the movie isn't a good thing , but you don't have to call the censors illiterate
    last time i read the names of the censors they were doctors and art people

    i think cinescape did this to her self , why they never enforce the rules , 6-8 years ago ( before i stop going to KNCC ) i used to go to the movies at least once a month , i entered an R rated movie and i looked around and there were at least 20-30 kids ! no older than 12 !

    now if KNCC enforced the rules before , they could get the movies and just say " why you care ? no kids are going to watch it " the rule is enforced in UK when i went there , and mostly enforced in the US

    also The UK has censor , you write to them and they can do a lot of stuff ( fine , ban ,,,etc )
    oh and your favorate county UAE also censor ( for sometime the posters that KNCC showed had UAE censor aproval stamp )
    so its not kuwait only that censor

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  15. im guessing brokeback mountain is a definate no? ;P

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  16. توني ياي من الفلم , والله عجيب و ما فيه لقطات مخلة الا في ما ندر

    سلام

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  17. يعنى جد تخلف
    تخيل واحد متعنى طاق درب و نص ساعه يدور موقف و قاص تذكره بدينارين و نص
    علشان يشوف بوسه و لا أثنين نايميين بالفراش
    الرقابه لازالت تعمل بعقلية الخمسينات
    بوسه قصها
    FU
    ترجمها ايها الوغد
    و كروت الستلايت بحولى تنباع بدينارين
    تناقض

    يحيا الدى فى دى حتى أشعار آخر
    و صج شكرة السينما عايشيين الدور و عبالهم صج

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  18. بره الموضوع
    أتخيل فى مصر راح يترجمون أسم الفلم الى
    مذكرات عيشه

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  19. يا سيد زيدون ، اولا يجب ان تعرف ان هذا الرقيب هو آمة ضحكت حتى ترشدقت علي ظهرها الامم.
    ثانيا ، مثل هذا الرقيب يبدو من افعاله انه ليس من حكومه :
    By the people , for the people , to the people .
    ولكنه من رقابه من التخلف ، الي التخلف، و للتخلف !!

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  20. forza.. that just makes it worse. If they are indeed doctors and arts people as you say, then their actions are totally inexcusable!!

    As for the rules, they are beside the point. The censors don't cut scenes to "protect teenagers", but because they don't want mature adults to see something that is against عاداتنا وتقاليدنا, as if we don't see all of that and more on TV in our homes!!

    It has nothing to do with age-appropriate material and poor KNCC is helpless in enforcing a ratings system. Imagine the hapless box office clerks telling a mother of five أم لسان that she can't bring her screaming kids into an adult movie. من يقدر عليهم؟؟ I've said this before, but I'll never forget the pre-school kids at Gladiator!

    مطقوق
    I rest my case!

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  21. its just like everything else in kuwait....we still living in this protective bubble....with regards to blackening pages in magazines,porn sites,the cinema and no booze.Fucking ridiculous that in this day and age they actually think they can stop people from doing whatever/ getting whatever they want....and you know what,,,it will never change which is what makes kuwait kuwait!

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  22. You can always get the book, if you want.

    And why do they sell the book if it's so 'bad' ? I got my own copy from *here*. Is it because they know that Kuwaitis are so unintelligent they don't read books? I found 'Magical Thinking' by Augusten Burroughs in the bookstore(s) here. The guy's a homosexual and much of the book discusses his homosexual relationships. Why don't they ban that? Let's not forget Vampire books that are so perverted, disgustingly so. All sold here.

    Urgh, sickening sickening super-sickening ..
    The last time I went to a cinema here was ages ago, it was Scream 3 and the reason why I never go to cinemas is because of this scene-omitting thing.

    5anshoof wazeer el yedeed might do something about this -- something positive, I hope

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  23. وزارة الاعلام تقول في تصريح رسمي بان الفلم يتعارض مع عاداتنا وتقاليدنا ، هاللو ، بالطبع يتعارض مع عاداتكم وتقاليدكم فهو فلم عن اليابان ، يا آمة ضحكت من جهلها الامم !!!!

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  24. Gone said...
    وزارة الاعلام تقول في تصريح رسمي بان الفلم يتعارض مع عاداتنا وتقاليدنا ، هاللو ، بالطبع يتعارض مع عاداتكم وتقاليدكم فهو فلم عن اليابان ، يا آمة ضحكت من جهلها الامم

    أعجبني جوابك........تحية ذكية

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  25. Whether or not, a geisha is same as a prostitute, is peripheral. Prostitutes are about as human as any of the rest of us with "supposedly high morals" and we owe them; to hear their side of the story; be it on film, telly,radio or in print.

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  26. If they're going to ban movies with prostitutes, they can start with Arabic classics like
    اللص والكلاب

    Shadia played a hooker in that movie, and it was a knockout performance. One of her best!

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  27. Quite how anyone should give their "all clear" to 'Fun with Dick & Jane' while at the same time, withdraw 'Memoirs of A Geisha,' frankly, escapes me. :)
    At the very least, the censors ought to have cow dunged the movie title to avoid any potential audience embarrassment that might ensue, when it came to asking for a ticket to go watch 'Fun with Dick & Jane' at the cinema(can you even imagine allowing the 'Jane' in the film title to be so closely sited to a 'Dick,' I mean for flippin' crying out loud, this is "purer than pure Q8" we are talking about, for Censors' sake?!). I never thought I'd live to see this day with such reckless albeit inconsistent standards from the Censor board.
    What a wasted opportunity for them! I hold them squarely responsible for the loss of my innocence which all started the day I visited this film.
    God deliver us from Q8 censors'!
    TUB
    PS: Btw, the doctors on the censor board; they wouldn't happen to be some Ph.Ds in theology/feigned morality, would they?

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  28. Exactly what I was effin thinking!
    It's just ridiculously ludicrous. Oh wait and moronicly retarded.

    Haha.

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  29. After much tossing and turning in the bed I am finally able to crack this one!
    I think it highely likely that whoever raised an objection was the local sponsor of a Bangladeshi pimp operating a successful chain of brothels up and down the country. Worried that this movie might finally clear the public 's misgivings about geishas; enough to make parliamentarians legislate on legalizing of the geisha profession in Kuwait, he was moved to exorcize his wicked offices with the Ministry of Misinformation.

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Keep it clean, people!