[Reader-list] Naeem Mohaiemen did not deserve an answer

Thu Sep 13 12:50:53 IST 2007

Actually, the issue is moot. Taken from a personal point of view, if there's
a movie (even pornographic or torture or Mel Gibson's epic on Christ) - it's
my choice whether or not I want to see it.

Even having gone for a viewing, I am free to get up and walk out if I
disagree with the topic or the bias.

However, acting as a censor is not justifiable as long as it does not
intrude on someone's private life and opens out something s/he would like to
keep private.

That again, as we see in today's 'stings' is a thought open to
interpretation.

And that's got nothing to do with 'moral courage' - the reason this post is
so brief is that I'd rather spend my time and effort in more productive
pursuits.

Rgds, Partha

On 9/13/07, Kshmendra Kaul <kshmendra2005 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Ten days back, Naeem Mohaiemen posted a question "Is There Nothing You
> would Censor". It was pertinent to the then ongoing discussion about
> "freedoms".
>
>   No one answered him. None of the leading lights of this "intellectual
> community" thought the question deserved an answer.
>
>   The bunch of 'La La Land" hypocrites did not have the moral courage to
> answer.
>
>   Kshmendra Kaul
>
>   PS:
>   Dear Naeem
>
>   It might upset you that the likes of me should be using your posting to
> make a point. You might ignore it, but if I receive a sharp retort from you,
> I will understand.
>
>   KK
>
>
>
>
>
> Naeem Mohaiemen <naeem.mohaiemen at gmail.com> wrote:
>   The question was asked repeatedly on Sarai list recently, "are there
> films whose screenings you would stop"?
>
> Could it be, that even now, there are certain lines to be drawn? Read
> on....
>
>
> Already Under Fire, a Producer Is Going Further
> By MICHAEL CIEPLY/NYT
> Published: June 25, 2007
>
> ...Having already provoked parents, women's groups and the ratings
> board with explicit ads for the coming torture movie ''Captivity,''
> Mr. Solomon and his After Dark Films now intend to introduce the film,
> set for release July 13, with a party that may set a new standard for
> the politically incorrect.
>
> ...But the warren of live torture rooms is a must. As Mr. Solomon
> envisions it, individuals in torture gear will wander through the West
> Hollywood club Privilege grabbing partygoers. All of which is a
> prelude to an undisclosed main event that, he warned last week over
> slices of pizza a few doors from his company's new offices on the
> Sunset Strip, is ''probably not legal.'' "'The women's groups
> definitely will love it,'' Mr. Solomon hinted. ''I call it my personal
> little tribute to them.''
>
> Mr. Solomon, a fast-talking 35-year-old, and his genre-film company
> were barely noticed until outrage at the ''Captivity'' billboards --
> which chronicled a young woman's torment, with frames titled
> ''Abduction,'' ''Confinement,'' ''Torture,'' ''Termination'' -- led to
> a rare censure by the Motion Picture Association of America this
> spring.
>
> When the association's ratings board suspended its process for a month
> as a punitive measure, ''Captivity'' missed its May release date and
> was bumped to June 22. But Bob Weinstein and his Dimension Films
> wanted that date for their competing horror film ''1408,'' and he
> persuaded Mr. Solomon to swap for Friday, July 13. Mr. Solomon quickly
> called that Friday ''Captivity Day.''
>
> ...These added explicit torture , including a so-called ''milkshake''
> scene that involves body parts and a blender, to a picture that was
> largely psychological in its thrust when After Dark acquired the
> rights to it.
>
> Government to Take a Hard Look at Horror
> By MICHAEL CIEPLY/NYT
> Published: March 24, 2007
>
>
> ...Earlier this week, After Dark and Lionsgate scrambled to contain
> the public-relations damage after a Los Angeles Times columnist quoted
> several young students objecting to an especially gruesome billboard
> for ''Captivity'' near their middle school. After Dark, which is
> expected to release the film on May 18 with Lionsgate, quickly agreed
> to pull part of its ad campaign.
>
> ....Horror aficionados date the genre's current flourishing to October
> 2004. The first of Lionsgate's ''Saw'' movies, about a demonically
> inventive serial killer, opened to a surprisingly strong $18 million
> on its first weekend, though it lacked an expensive cast or a
> pedigreed filmmaker. Sequels, imitators and close cousins soon
> followed.
>
> ...Fox Atomic, a division formed by Fox Searchlight to cultivate the
> late-teenage and early-adult audience, on March 6 placed an ad for its
> film ''The Hills Have Eyes 2'' with an evening showing of
> ''Dodgeball,'' rated PG-13, on FX. The ad identified ''Hills,'' about
> National Guard trainees brutally murdered by mutants, as being not yet
> rated, though film association guidelines call for the disclosure of
> ratings in ads, and the company had accepted an R rating the day
> before. John Hegeman, Fox Atomic's chief operating officer, said the R
> rating was missing because it takes about two days to alter a
> television spot
>
> ....official sites for R-rated fare -- deal with
> Bloody-disgusting.com, Arrow in the Head (joblo.com/arrow),
> Fangoria.com, or any of another dozen such Web sites.
> (Bloody-disgusting, for example, includes chat forums that address
> such questions as: ''Can anyone suggest a good torture-esk
> movie?'')...The operators of several such sites said they had no way
> of knowing how many of their visitors were under 17, but believed the
> numbers were substantial. ''The horror site skews a little more toward
> the younger ones,'' said Berge Garabedian, founder of the Joblo.com
> film site and its associated Arrow in the Head horror section, which
> this week carried a banner ad for an unrated DVD of ''Sublime,'' about
> gruesome murder in a hospital, from Warner Home Video. Mr. Garabedian
> said he tried to block visitors under 15 from discussion boards in
> order to eliminate ''a lot of MySpace craziness,'' but thought a
> considerable share of his Arrow in the Head visitors to be in the
> 13-to-18-year-old age range.
>
> ....Experian Simmons Research found that 12 percent of respondents
> between the ages of 12 and 17 reported watching ''Saw II'' in
> theaters, while 12 percent said they had seen the film on DVD, and 26
> percent reported viewing any horror in theaters. In its 2004 report,
> the Federal Trade Commission said that in 36 percent of their
> attempts, its underage ''mystery shoppers'' were able to buy a movie
> ticket without an age check in theaters, down somewhat from about half
> in 2000. Meanwhile 81 percent of the young buyers obtained R-rated
> DVDs without a check.
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-- 
Partha Dasgupta (9811047132)
http://www.jaxtr.com/parthaekka