Over the past decade, China has emerged has emerged as one of the most important markets
in the world for film distribution.
Even big-budget movies that bomb in the US sometimes become profitable in China, like
Warcraft did earlier this year.
Still, China’s government isn’t completely open to Hollywood films crowding their movie
screens.
Sometimes, movies get banned for reasons you wouldn’t even think of.
Here is Screen Rant’s list of 10 Famous Movies That Were Banned In China.
Star Wars: A New Hope Last year’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens
was a huge hit in China last year, but ironically, the first Star Wars was never released in
the country.
Back in 1977, the only movies that got to play in the communist nation were produced
by the government.
Mao Zedong, the long time dictator of China, only died one year before George Lucas made
Star Wars, and he didn’t want the people of China to be “corrupted” by western
influences.
It wasn’t until 1994 that the government opened up the market to only 10 foreign films
a year.
Recently, that quota has been increased to 34 foreign films per year, but it’s still
far more restrictive than most countries.
To Live Hollywood movies aren’t the only ones to
get banned in China.
In 1994, acclaimed Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou made the film To Live.
The film played at the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Grand Prix, and was released
across the world to fantastic reviews.
But the one place it couldn’t be released was China.
Taking place in the early decades of China’s Communist regime, the film was accused of
portraying the government and its policies in a negative light.
Not only was the movie banned, but the director was forbidden from making movies for two years.
Still, it’s regarded as a classic by connoisseurs of Chinese cinema.
Brokeback Mountain Brokeback Mountain is an Oscar-winning drama
about a forbidden romance between two cowboys.
Due to its subject matter, the movie was even controversial when it came out in the United
States in 2005, so you can imagine how it went over in China.
Chinese censors rejected the movie for its depiction of homosexuality, but the government
was also ambivalent about the success of its Taiwanese director, Ang Lee.
To this day, China still claims that Taiwan is a part of its territory, from a conflict
that dates back to the Chinese civil war in the 1940s.
Still, that didn’t stop a state-run Chinese newspaper from declaring “Ang Lee is the
pride of Chinese people all over the world” when he won the Oscar for Best Director.
Avatar Avatar may be the most financially successful
movie of all time, but it didn’t get much help from China.
Two weeks after it was released in 2009, the Chinese government unexpectedly banned the
movie, and forced theaters to replace it with an historical epic about the life of Confucius.
Apparently, the government was worried that the movie’s depiction of the Na’vi -- you
know, the blue people -- would inspire a popular revolt among the people of China.
Weirdly, however, they only banned the movie in 2D.
It continued to play in about 900 3D theaters after they put the ban into effect.
Back to the Future A number of these movies were banned for political
reasons, but here’s a movie that was banned for the grave crime of… time travel?
In 2011, China banned depictions of time travel, which was becoming an increasingly popular
trope in Chinese film and television at the time.
Apparently, there was concern that depictions of time travel were disrespectful to the history
of China, especially when characters end up re-writing Chinese history.
One casualty of this ban was the super-popular ‘80s comedy Back to the Future.
If you’ll remember, Marty McFly not only changes the course of history in that film,
but also introduces Chuck Berry’s cousin to the guitar riffs of “Johnny B. Goode,”
surely angering Rock-n-roll purists all over the world.
Ghostbusters Paul Feig’s recent reboot of the Ghostbusters
franchise was controversial in the United States because the original film’s busters
were exchanged for an all-female cast.
But in China, it got rejected by the censors for a completely different reason: It was
because the country is still suspicious of movies that “promote superstition.”
Though this rule may seem silly in relation to Ghostbusters, it often applies to films
that depict ghosts and other supernatural beings.
Sony reportedly tried to appease censors by removing the character for “Ghost” from
the Chinese title, but the film still wasn’t approved for release.
Considering the film’s disappointing box office in the US, is was probably a blow to
the studio that they’re missing out on the Chinese audience.
Shinjuku Incident For over a century, Hong Kong was a British
colony, separate from the Chinese mainland.
To this day, it still retains a degree of independence over its own affairs -- including
its famous film industry.
In 2009, Hong Kong superstar Jackie Chan produced and starred in a hardboiled crime film called
Shinjuku Incident.
While the film was released in Hong Kong without incident, mainland Chinese censors banned
the film on the grounds that it was too violent for Chinese audiences.
China has yet to implement a rating system like other countries, so Jackie Chann has
made more family-friendly action comedies in the years since.
Deadpool Deadpool was another film that was rejected
by Chinese censors for its adult material.
Comic book fans flocked to the movie on account of its irreverent, potty-mouthed sense of
humor, but that’s the exact same reason it never made it to theatres in China.
Without the equivalent of an “R” rating to keep out kids, censors had no choice but
to ban the movie entirely.
Movies are sometimes edited to appease censors in China, but that hardly would have been
possible for a movie like Deadpool.
The Ryan Reynolds-starring superhero movie is so full of dirty jokes and gruesome violence
that studios would probably have to cut most of the movie to make it suitable for all ages.
The Dark Knight Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight is another
comic book film that was rejected by Chinese censors.
It’s been speculated that the film was rejected because of a scene where Batman captures a
fugitive from an office tower in Hong Kong and extradites him to the US to face prosecution.
The Chinese government probably didn’t like the way Batman flouted international law or
Chinese sovereignty.
They also may have objected to a brief cameo from singer Edison Chen.
Sexually explicit photographs of the Hong Kong celebrity leaked online earlier that
year, and he had become quite controversial by that point in time.
Regardless, The Dark Knight is widely available on pirated DVDs for Chinese comic book fans.
Suicide Squad Suicide Squad was a major hit when it was
released in the US, but it never even got a chance in China.
Even though it was retitled to the less suggestive “Task Force X” for a potential release,
the government hasn’t included it in their quota of Hollywood films for 2016.
This could be because of the violence, or because of the supernatural themes, or maybe
they just didn’t like the idea of a movie about supervillains who become heroes.
Perhaps Jared Leto’s performance as The Joker was just a tad bit too twisted for Chinese
authorities.
Whatever the case, it’s a big blow to Warner Bros., whose Batman v Superman earned a big
chunk of its box office in China earlier this year.
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So what do you think of our list?
Were any others banned from China for crazy reasons?
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