Renowned director Nagisa Oshima, who was at the helm for "Merry Christmas Mr.
Lawrence," was involved in a decades long battle with Eirin over the depiction
of genitalia in his controversial 1976 flick "In the Realm of the Senses."
Oshima claimed the famously revealing movie was art, but Eirin insisted it was
pornographic and censors sliced through the movie. Even when given a re-run in
Japanese theaters five years ago, Eirin still make adjustments to 15 parts of
the movie.
The closest genitalia have come to being screened publicly in Japan was the
briefest of glimpses of a male member that pops up when two football players
clash in Oliver Stone's "Any Given Sunday" in 1999.
But, with the Japanese premiere in late August of "Kinsey," local moviegoers
will get their first unadulterated glimpse of both male and female reproductive
organs.
"We discussed it quite a bit internally before deciding the scene where the
organs appear is really important for the overall movie and that we wanted it
to be screened uncut and without a mosaic," a spokesman for Shochiku, the
distributor of "Kinsey," tells Shukan Post.
Eirin, which has a strict policy of prohibiting the display or genitalia or
pubic hair, has bent when it comes to "Kinsey," a biopic of U.S. sex academic
Alfred Kinsey.
"It's not on screen for long and, overall, we decided that the scene did not
touch on Eirin's regulations," a spokesman for the movie ethics committee tells
Shukan Post.
"Kinsey" tells the story of the academic's study of the sexual practice of some
18,000 white Americans in the 1940s and '50s. The academic later wrote up his
findings in "The Kinsey Report," which made him famous throughout the world.
The scene in "Kinsey" where the genitalia are displayed features Liam Neeson as
the title character explaining the reproductive act to a group of university
students. The scene is depicted as an earth-shattering moment in Kinsey's life
because it prompts him to realize that existing sex education is insufficient
and he begins his study to find data to back up his demand for improvements.
Japanese sex educationalists are hoping "Kinsey" will reveal more than mere
members.
"There's nothing dirty about the scene where the genitalia are displayed. In
fact, I thought it showed how serious an academic Kinsey was. This movie does
not just show Kinsey's life, it also has the added value of sparking discussion
about modern sexuality. There aren't too many academics like Kinsey nowadays.
And, no matter how open we've become about sexuality, there are still many
areas that remain taboo," Japan's foremost sexologist Kim Myung Gan tells
Shukan Post. "There's a chance that showing this movie without a mosaic may
deepen discussion about sex education. Hopefully, this movie could establish a
precedent for how sexuality is depicted."
Copyright 1999-2005, Mainchi Daily. Used with permission. All rights
reserved. Ryann Connell is a Staff Writer and Senoir Desk Editor for the
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