Islamabad, (EFE).- The authorities of the Punjab province, in eastern Pakistan, suspended the screening of the movie ‘Barbie’ in its cinemas for including “questionable content”, and ordered that it be reviewed by a committee of the censorship board, sources from the administration informed EFE this Saturday.
The tape “has been sent to a committee for review. After that it will be banned or shown in theaters with some censored fragments,” the secretary of the Punjab Film Censorship Board, Farrukh Mahmood, told EFE.
The official qualified that its broadcast “is not prohibited” completely, but temporarily until the “questionable” parts of the film that was released yesterday in the province of Sindh, in the south of the country, and in the capital Islamabad are eliminated.
Mahmood did not reveal, however, what content the Punjab junta found objectionable.
“I have not seen it, so I do not know about the questionable content (…) but I can say that it exists.”
Films in Pakistan must be approved by the provincial censorship boards before being shown in theaters.
Pakistan last year banned the release of the feature film ‘Joyland’, which tells the love story of a young man from a traditional Islamic family and a trans dancer, as “repugnant to the country’s standards of decency and morality”.
A veto that contrasted with its international success, since the film won the Jury prize in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes festival and the Queer Palm awarded by the contest, as well as being an official candidate for the 2023 Oscars.
Although the ban on Joyland was lifted after being reviewed, its broadcast continued to be banned in Punjab.
The movie Barbie, directed by Greta Gerwig and starring Margot Robbie as the famous Barbie doll and Ryan Gosling as her boyfriend Ken, was released yesterday worldwide to the deep expectation of fans of the blonde plastic doll.
