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From the Associated Press

Warner Bros. decides not to release Batman flick in China because of 'cultural sensitivities'

By MIN LEE

AP Entertainment Writer

380 words

24 December 2008

01:59

Associated Press Newswires

English

(c) 2008. The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

HONG KONG (AP) - Hollywood blockbuster "The Dark Knight," which sees Batman venturing to Hong Kong to capture a Chinese criminal, won't be getting an official release in China.

Warner Bros. said in a statement Tuesday it decided not to release the film in China because of "prerelease conditions" and "cultural sensitivities to some elements of the film."

A spokeswoman for the Hollywood studio declined to elaborate.

Warner Bros. officials may have been concerned the film -- particularly the scenes shot in Hong Kong -- would offend censors wary of the way Chinese are portrayed on screen. Hong Kong is a Chinese-ruled former British colony that maintains separate political and economic systems from the mainland.

Another possible sticking point is a brief appearance in the film by Hong Kong actor-singer Edison Chen, who saw his image tarnished earlier this year by the release of photos showing him and several women performing sexual acts.

The spokeswoman, who declined to be named in line with company policy, said Warner Bros., a unit of Time Warner Inc., did not even submit the movie to Chinese censors for approval.

The Chinese movie market, while growing, is still small compared to the U.S. market. A movie that makes $15 million in China is considered a hit.

By comparison, "The Dark Knight" raked in $531 million in the U.S. this year, according to figures compiled by the box office tracking Web site Box Office Mojo.

The movie -- which stars Christian Bale and the late Heath Ledger -- will be this year's box office champion in the U.S., beating second-place "Iron Man" by more than $200 million.

China has blocked other Hollywood movies for political reasons. The 2005 film "Memoirs of a Geisha" was not released apparently because the sight of Chinese actresses Zhang Ziyi and Gong Li portraying Japanese entertainers would offend mainland viewers.

Even when barred from the mainland's cinemas, pirated copies of Hollywood films can easily be found on the streets of most of China's cities.

Bootleg copies of "The Dark Knight" have been available in Chinese markets for months.

Well that isn't new china's really tight on things. For example MTG cards featuring skeltons or undead in the art are replaced.

I like the blurb at the end where it just says, in a nutshell, "It's ok, because we already saw it when it got released in American through bootlegs. Awesome movie!". I don't know why China does this. Yeah sure, you can censor everything. But people will always find a way to uncensor it in their lives.

Even funnier was last year for Pirates of Caribbean 3 they cut out all of Chow Yang Fat's scenes since they didn't want chinese portrayed as pirates. So if you wanted to see him you have to buy...

a pirate copy.

On the censorship angle do peer to peer downloading services (limewire, torrent etc) work in China or does the internet restrictions block it?

Interesting thet WB didn''t even bother rather than trying and getting part of the movie chopped or blocked altogether.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:

Interesting thet WB didn''t even bother rather than trying and getting part of the movie chopped or blocked altogether.

Maybe they are believing in the artistic integrity of the movie as a whole and would rather not release it if they have to edit it from the way it is. yeah... I know... hard to believe but I hope this is the case. Besides.. they did mention that a movie is considered a blockbuster if it pulls 15 million. Somehow it almost seems as if that really isn't enough money for them to even fight it out. Now that I thihnk about it, it is probably the small amount of money they moght get instead of artistic integrity.

P2P stuff works here, at least so I'm told. Pirate CDs have almost disappeared after being undercut by internet pirates The largest search engine here is www.baidu.com and has a specific search tab for MP3s.

Pirate DVD continue to flurish since most people use internet cafes rather than connections at home.

While on the subject of censorship and piracy:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/26/world/asia/26tibet.html?_r=1&hp

BEIJING — The police have detained 59 people in Tibet on charges that they sought to foment unrest by spreading ethnic hatred and by downloading and selling banned songs, Chinese state media reported Thursday.

SIGH...

It's not like the Chinese are alone in censorship - just ask the Brits...

JohnHwangDD wrote:It's not like the Chinese are alone in censorship - just ask the Brits...

Any Brits care to tell us about this?

Or is it in relation to the Banning of A Clockwork Orange? (Which I saw a few weeks ago and thought was awful)

We have the British Board of Film Classification which reviews all movies and videos and gives them a rating. It's similar to OFLC.

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/

Also there are government run internet filters that prevent any mention of *******, ****, or ******.

But...you did see the Dark Knight, haven't you Kyoto? :S

JohnHwangDD wrote:It's not like the Chinese are alone in censorship - just ask the Brits...

Que ?

Clockwork Orange...? na that was self banded by the director ... basically it was meant to show how the world was becoming, but ... when some people watched it they thought "You know that would be Fun" and used it as a reference guide

On the whole i don't think that BBFC doesn't do a bad job (god that's a horrible double negative ... they do a good job). I mean take GTA 'Hot Coffee', around the world it was take off shelves ... here they just say "no its fine its already got 18 certificate that covers it"

Anung Un Rama wrote:But...you did see the Dark Knight, haven't you Kyoto? :S

I saw it when I was home in the US. Heckuva lot better than Batman Begins (aka Batman goes shopping and somehow no one notices he's using all of these 1 of a kind military prototypes that only Waynetech has access to).

Kilkrazy wrote:We have the British Board of Film Classification

which reviews all movies and videos and gives them a rating.

Also there are government run internet filters that prevent any mention of *******, ****, or ******.

"Film Censors", IIRC. I'm guessing we have Orwellian doublespeak with a rename, kind of like "Homeland Security". :S

True, and they also ban a number of films outright. Of course, we ban child porn, so no government is immune.

What amuses me most is that you guys have to buy a license to watch TV that is broadcast publicly.

Not a single person in the staff quarters I lived at when I worked in the UK had paid their TV license.

I bought a TV within 3 hours of clearing customs at Heathrow and had it running by 4 hours.

Then I went to Oxford street and to the Plaza GW.

I was =LAME.

I don't even wanna start talking about censors in germany

@JohnHwangDD
I gladly pay my TV license ... we get BBC channels with great shows, without adverts ... when ever i watch US TV i'm always amazed at how long the ad breaks are

@Waaagh_Gonads ... lot of people don't, lot of people don't pay for health care while there over here ether (its only free if you pay tax)... its one of those things, it not wrong untill you get caught

Its like tipping.

We just don't do it in Australia and when you go to the US where it is essentially demanded we find it really, really hard to justify it unless they have given top notch service.

We don't pay for TV so why do it in the UK. It just seems a foreign concept.

You don't give tips in Oz? Never heard of that before.

The licence fee pays for the BBC.

It costs about £150 per year per household. In return we get seven national radio channels, the world service, two analogue and four digital TV channels, all without adverts. And one of the world's best websites.

We also get a load of local radio channels but you can't have everything in this life.

Totally agree.

The license fee is a small price to pay for the best TV stations, best Radio stations and Best news services in the UK, quite possibly the western world.

Incidentally I trust the BBC more than any other news source on the planet. It's the only one that I feel isn't constantly pushing an agenda.

The Beeb gets allot of bad press, especially from the right wing. I honestly thinks its just sour grapes that the Beeb refuses to join in with their agenda and hatred and ignorance.

Anung Un Rama wrote:You don't give tips in Oz? Never heard of that before.

Only people with too much money and not enough sense tip in Australia (New Zealand is the same I believe).

Various coffee houses and resturants are trying to bring it in but their workers aren't getting underpaid like they do in the US.
When I found that out from my US tour director we started tipping, but even then it was usually 10% .
IIRC I tipped willingly 15% twice for good service.

Giving a tip to table staff at the casino resort (self serve) buffet for cleaning my table after I leave does not justify a 15% tip.
They got a couple of bucks change.

Now I'm older and have travelled more I'd happily pay a TV license if I was back in the UK.
Paying for each TV in the house (if they still do that) may be more difficult.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:Now I'm older and have travelled more I'd happily pay a TV license if I was back in the UK.
Paying for each TV in the house (if they still do that) may be more difficult.

Nope, flat fee. I think it's great value too. It means that even programmes on other channels have less adverts, because there's a competitor without that annoyance, so they need to stop people surfing. It also makes wonderful programmes that just wouldn't get made by other broadcasting companies because the audience share is low, and the content is high-quality (ie. expensive).

There's no tipping in Japan. It's great.

France has a system where a standard service charge (I think it's 12.5%) is built into the restaurant prices.

The UK is thinking of introducing the same system.

IMO, this tipping thing has gotten out of hand. I remember when 10% was a really good tip.

Now, people want 15%, 18%. That's getting kind of crazy.

JohnHwangDD wrote:IMO, this tipping thing has gotten out of hand. I remember when 10% was a really good tip.

Now, people want 15%, 18%. That's getting kind of crazy.

It would only be crazy if more restaurants in America paid servers a living wage(most pay at or under minimum wage because tips are supposed to make up for it).

And WTH is a "living wage"?

JohnHwangDD wrote:"Film Censors", IIRC. I'm guessing we have Orwellian doublespeak with a rename, kind of like "Homeland Security". :S

True, and they also ban a number of films outright. Of course, we ban child porn, so no government is immune.

What amuses me most is that you guys have to buy a license to watch TV that is broadcast publicly.

The BBFC bans very few films, and most of those it does ban are recut and then passed. list of films banned since 1975. Real works of art there, I can see how people lost out on not seeing

A classic of Nazi filth & degradation according to one enthusiastic website. A particularly inventive scene involves a prisoner who knowing that she is going to be raped inserts a razor blade in her vagina. The commandant inevitably gets to suffer from a cleft shaft!

It's very rare now for a film to actually be banned, not least as the Gov. is somewhat aware of the internet and international posting etc etc. The open borders in Europe make this sort of thing hard to do as well. Hell bits of the South Coast you can pick up French telly with a standard ariel.


From what I've seen, US TV is much more conservative and frankly dull than a lot of what gets routinely broadcast over here. The whole world sat in stunned bemusement as your country went into meltdown over Janet Jackson's nipple.

And I'll add to the shouts of glee in support of the BBC, easily worth every penny.