No two audiences respond to a movie the same way. Apply that logic to countries around the world and, more specifically, the people in those countries who call the shots on what’s allowed to be screened there, and it shouldn’t be surprising that some films have been flat-out banned overseas.
Monty Python’s Life of Brian is almost 50 years old, and you can still potentially get fined for showing it in Germany under certain circumstances due to its strong religious themes. Making jokes at a country’s expense can be a big no-no as well, in addition to using the wrong colors in your movie, as you’ll soon find out.
Here are a few comedies that were prevented from being shown for both understandable and baffling reasons.
Despite being referred to as a “glorious” place in Borat, officials in Kazakhstan were none too pleased to be associated with such a film. A spokesperson for the Foreign Ministry vowed to do everything in his power to prevent Borat from being shown in Kazakhstan, citing the way its people were depicted on-screen. It was also banned in Russia for containing material that “might seem humiliating in relation to certain ethnic groups and religions.”
By the end of November 2006 (the same month it was released), Borat was banned in every Arab country except Lebanon.
The 2001 Ben Stiller comedy Zoolander was deemed “definitely unsuitable” for Malaysian audiences by the Home Affairs Film Censorship Board, presumably because of Stiller’s character being brainwashed into assassinating the country’s prime minister in the film. It was later condemned as being distasteful in light of efforts to combat terrorism.
Malaysia’s neighbor to the south, Singapore, decided to ban Zoolander the following year, too, without giving a specific reason. Films that received similar treatment in Singapore were said to have included excessive references to sex and drugs.
You wouldn’t think that anyone would find The Simpsons Movie offensive enough to stop it from being seen, but here we are. So what was the film’s major offense? Could it have been that part where Bart was shown skateboarding naked? That would make sense, we suppose. However, cartoon nudity had nothing to do with it.
As it turns out, the 2007 animated hit was kept out of theaters in Myanmar because of a strange rule that prohibits the use of yellow and red in films.
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