In India, Sony admits "Code" is fiction
To have the film released in India's cinemas, the film company accepted the censorship conditions: a warning will appear before and after the film, warning the spectator that it is only fiction, without historical validity. Sri Lanka has banned the film from its cinemas.
Mumbai (AsiaNews/Agencies) Sony Pictures has had second thoughts: the "Da Vinci Code" film, which it produced, is fiction without historical validity. The Indian authorities have secured that the film, taken from the novel of the same name by Dan Brown, will be screened in the country's cinemas with a disclaimer that warns spectators that the work is the fruit of pure "fiction". Meanwhile, Catholic protests in Sri Lanka have proved successful: the government has banned screening of the film.
To be able to release the "Code" in India, where it was delayed last week, Sony Pictures had to comply with the request of the Censor Board of India to insert a legal card at the beginning, for 15 seconds, and at the end of the film. The card reads something like this: "The characters and incidents portrayed and the names herein are fictitious, and any similarity to the name, character or history of any person is entirely coincidental and unintentional."
The censors demanded the double insertion of the so-called disclaimer, taking on board the requests of many Christian leaders and groups, who held strong protests against the release of the "Code" in India. At first, to guarantee that the film would be screened, Sony accepted to screen a simple warning that "any reference to incidents and persons is coincidental" only at the end of the film, not to spoil the film for viewers. But yesterday it was forced to change its mind.
Sri Lanka, a Buddhist-majority country, also heeded the calls of the Catholic community. The government went so far as to ban the screening of the "Code" in cinemas. In a letter to President Mahinda Rajapakse, the Bishops' Conference described the film as the "fruit of a perverted mind". The bishops said: "The book version has already caused confusion between fact and fiction. It is a false, unjust and irreverent portrayal of Jesus and the Catholic Church, accused of being essentially a vast network founded on maintaining the lie of Jesus' Divinity." They add: "This work attacks the very roots of our faith and hurts the religious sensibilities of all Christians." The book of Dan Brown denies the divine nature of Christ and fantasizes about his surviving lineage.
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