Thailand Bans 'Subversive' Film Adaptation of Macbeth

Thai censors sensitive to depictions of monarchy
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Apr 4, 2012 2:30 AM CDT
Thailand Bans 'Subversive' Film Adaptation of Macbeth
Director Ing Kanjanavanit, who made an adaptation of "Macbeth" called "Shakespeare Must Die," has had her film stopped by Thai authorities.   (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit)

Thailand's film censors have banned an adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth, saying it could inflame political passions in the country where it is taboo to criticize the monarchy. The Thai-language film Shakespeare Must Die is about a theater group in a fictional country resembling Thailand that is staging a production of Macbeth, in which an ambitious general murders his way to the Scottish throne.

Director Ing Kanjanavanit said that censors felt politically violent scenes in the film "could cause divisiveness among the people of the nation." Thailand is known to be heavy-handed with censorship, from banning anti-monarchy criticism to blurring pictures of cigarettes and alcohol on television. (More Thailand stories.)

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