No ‘Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ for UAE movie fans

Monday, 2 January 2012 3:05 PM

(Picture for illustrative purposes only)

‘The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo’, an adaptation of Stieg Larsson's novel by the same name, won’t be showing in UAE cinemas after the film’s director declined cuts requested by censors.

The movie contains graphic scenes of violence and sexual abuse but it is understood that director David Fincher declined to allow the censorship needed to release the film in the Gulf country.

“We were asked to make seven or eight cuts to the film, which amounted to about three or four minutes,” said Kifah Ghraizi, operations manager at Empire, the UAE distributer for the film.

“All of the removed scenes contained nudity or of a sexual nature - no material was removed for religious or political reasons. But [director] David Fincher himself was not happy with the edits and has forbidden the film to be shown in the new format.”

The film is based on the first of a trilogy of crime novels by Swedish author Larsson. The plot follows journalist Mikael Blomkvist, played by British actor Daniel Craig, as he investigates the 40-year-old case of the disappearance of a wealthy young woman, aided by a tattooed, punk female computer hacker.

The $90m Hollywood version is a remake of a 2009 Swedish adaption by Danish director Niels Arden Oplev. The film has received glowing reviews in the US and UK, earning $69m at the global box office since its released on Dec 21 last year.

Fincher was previously responsible for box office heavyweights The Social Network and Fight Club.

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Posted by: Jezinho Thursday, 5 January 2012 11:37 AM[UAE] - Bahrain

Whilst I respect the position of the UAE censor (note that in the UK we have a classification board rather than a censor), I still don't understand why such objection is raised to scenes of sex and nudity whilst there appears to be no issue with scenes of gratuitous violence. In Bahrain, Gangs of New York (itself a pretty tedious film) had a love scene cut (which meant that a key element of the plot was missed) whereas scenes of guys merrily chopping each other to pieces was deemed to be suitable family viewing.

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Posted by: American in the USA Thursday, 5 January 2012 9:07 AM[UAE] - Kuwait

I saw the movie in the USA and it WILL NEVER BE SHOWN ANYWHERE IN THE MIDDLE EAST "AS IS."

Cutting any of it would ruin the movie completely.

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Posted by: Bo Engstrom Wednesday, 4 January 2012 7:28 PM[UAE] - Sweden

The author spent all his life fighting for the women's rights and against nazi streamings in the society. In this case men's superiority over clever and intelligent women.

I can understand the decision made by the UAE authorities as the film as such could seen as a provocation of the UAE way of life.

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Posted by: Red Snappa Tuesday, 3 January 2012 5:25 PM[UAE] - Ireland

A laudable stand against censorship that destroys artistic integrity, another retrograde step in a much touted media destination?

However, as a word of advice to all you fillum buffs out there it is an excellente piece of cinema, catch it where glasnost prevails.

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Posted by: Lionheart Tuesday, 3 January 2012 4:01 PM[UAE] - Qatar

The director won't lose any sleep over this . A lot of really good movies here don't get aired as it's just lost on a lot of residents . Hollywood Blockbusters and Cartoons and Pixar stuff are the normal fodder here.

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