Censors' scissors are doing less damage on screen, but inconsistencies remain

One of the best films of the year was a disturbing, but deeply poignant, drama about paedophilia and its psychological impact on its victims.

The acclaimed Mysterious Skin, which was screened in July, was so graphic that film distributor Golden Village decided against bringing the film in, fearing that the censors' scissors would ruin the audience's appreciation of the film.

The independent film was eventually brought in by Cathay with an R21 rating and a couple of minor cuts ­ although nothing so extreme that the story was lost.

"In the case of Mysterious Skin, it was a good example of how the censors have learnt to look at context and not content. It's perhaps a sign that censorship is coming of age," said Kenneth Tan, the managing director of Golden Village cinemas.

With the range of films now offered here, censorship is indeed coming of age. Cinemagoers have more choice, more of the time.

More films, fewer cuts

This is no coincidence. Context over content was one of the aims of the new film classification system, which was introduced in September 2003 and took effect in March last year.

In addition to the existing ratings of G, PG, NC16 and R(A), the new M18 (Mature 18) band was introduced.

The R(A) rating was changed to R21, with the censorship review committee of 2003 proposing to "allow greater leeway to non-exploitative sex and nudity" in content for adults as well to take a "more flexible and contextual approach" to homosexual content in film.

While the changes were met with a lukewarm response when they were announced two years ago, cinemagoers are seeing the difference now.

"The system is more in sync with the mature film markets in developed countries now," said social commentator Koh Buck Song, who was on the previous censorship review committee in 1992.

"Censorship is moving in the right direction to become the more enlightened system that those previously seen as advocates on the more liberal side of the spectrum had been arguing for years."

Aside from a wider variety of films, censors are being more controlled with their scissors, thanks in part to the more diverse ratings.

In fact, what audiences are experiencing now is the result of a slow but progressive move away from hard-line censorship.

"We are moving towards classification and industry co-regulation. Cinemagoers had more options following the introduction of the revised classification system," said Koh June May, senior manager of corporate and marketing communications at the Media Development Authority (MDA).

Prior to the introduction of M18, there was rarely a middle ground between PG and R(A). There was NC16, which was introduced in 1992, but it took seven years before the NC16 rating was given to Saving Private Ryan. Even after that, it was not often used.

(It is now, although to an uneven extent: The bawdy humour in an adult comedy such as Wedding Crashers garnered the film an NC16 rating, but so, too, the fairly tame sex scenes in the Bae Yong Jun adultery drama April Snow.)

Before the new system was established, film distributors sometimes faced an awkward balancing act: Release a film with certain risqué scenes with a PG rating and expect cuts. Or, release the film uncut and expect to be rated R(A), which would damage the film's box office potential.

So M18 was a significant middle ground for a wider audience to see more films in their original form.

Take DeLovely, for instance. It was a biopic of the life and times of composer Cole Porter, which most Western audiences considered acceptable for a PG-13 audience, but the honest depiction of Porter's homosexuality made conservatives in Singapore wary.

The film was eventually passed with an M18 rating and screened here last October.

The M18 rating has certainly proven to be useful, beginning with the first M18 film to be released here: The Passion of the Christ in May last year.

From that to last month's new releases Domino and Sympathy for Lady Vengeance ­ rated M18 for violence and sexuality ­ all these films were passed uncut.

Referring to slasher cult favourites House of 1,000 Corpses and its sequel The Devil's Rejects, both of which were screened here with the NC16 and M18 rating respectively, Golden Village's Tan said "I'm amazed by what has been allowed on screen here in recent years.

"In some ways, we've become more liberal than Taiwan or Hong Kong. I doubt a film like Mysterious Skin would be allowed in Taiwan, for example."

Less sex, more violence

But inconsistencies remain with the way censors regard sexuality and violence. While sexual content creates apprehension, there seems to be a more leeway with violent content.

"The censors always aim to keep pace with standards that audiences are generally comfortable with. Traditionally, violence has met with less opposition than sexually explicit content," said Koh.

"Rightly or wrongly, there is a higher threshold of acceptance among audiences that viewing violent content has a lower chance of inspiring 'copycat' behaviour."

Even so, audiences have seen a comparatively higher number of critically well-received films that deal with alternative sexualities this year, ranging from the German coming of age drama Summer Storm to Stanley Kwan's Lan Yu to the quirky American-Chinese comedy Saving Face.

In February, Shaw is bringing in Brokeback Mountain, the award-winning film by acclaimed director Lee Ang starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger.

Despite the improvement, however, film distributor Festive Film's managing director Low Yuen Ping, believes the censorship guidelines could still be clearer.

"When the censorship review committee made the recommended changes, we were told that R21 would accommodate what is considered more mature themes, which includes homosexual themes," he said.

"While the new ratings system has definitely allowed a wider range of films to be shown, distributors are sometimes uncertain as to exactly which films can be passed, and which ones cannot."

He should know. The answer from the censors was 'no' when he first tried to bring in Lan Yu, a Chinese film about two gay lovers, which was originally released overseas in 2001. Under the new classification system, though, the film was screened uncut last month under the R21 rating.

Finding the right balance

Despite this, another Chinese gay film Festive Films tried to bring in was given the red light: The Taiwanese romantic comedy Formula 17, in which most of the characters are gay.

"The Films Consultative Panel felt that Lan Yu had met guidelines as it did not promote or glamorise a homosexual lifestyle. Formula 17 on the other hand promoted and encouraged homosexuality as a lifestyle," said MDA's Koh.

Of course, idealists will argue that a more varied ratings system should mean that films be screened uncensored under the appropriate ratings.

But considering the gap between the two censorship review committees was a decade, meeting only in 1992 and 2002, there is still some way to go.

"Rightfully, the audience should be the ones to decide what films they see. That would be the sign of a mature society," said Festive Films' Low.