On Friday, the Pakistan government decided to lift the ban on Saim Sadiq’s critically-acclaimed film Joyland after it was reviewed for the second time by a committee formed by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. The news was tweeted by the head of the Prime Minister’s Strategic Reforms Salman Sufi who said that freedom of speech is a fundamental right and it should be nourished within ambits of the law. The movie will now be released on November 18 but some scenes would be cut before it opens across the country.
This is days after the government imposed a ban on the movie, claiming it contained ‘highly objectionable material. The movie reportedly got a screening certificate from the government on August 17. It was the official entry of Pakistan for the 2023 Oscars.
The film #Joyland has been cleared for release by the Censor board review committee formed at the direction of PM @CMShehbaz
— Salman Sufi (Get New Covid Booster Today) (@SalmanSufi7) November 16, 2022
Freedom of speech is fundamental right & should be nourished within ambits of the law. #JoylandBan https://t.co/vQodv7fjOk
According to the reports, PM Shehbaz appointed an eight-member committee on Tuesday to investigate accusations that the film was against social and moral norms and make recommendations for further action. The committee was chaired by the minister for political affairs, economic affairs, and law and justice, as well as the ministers for information and broadcasting, communications, board of investment, information technology, and telecommunications, adviser to the Prime Minister of Gilgit-Baltistan, PTA chairman, and PEMRA chairman.
The committee determined that some portions of the film needed to be cut. It has agreed to distribute the movie while the government has not yet removed the notification of its ‘uncertified’ status. The committee was founded in response to a significant social media protest over the withdrawal of Joyland’s censorship certificate. All censor boards in the country approved the picture, but it ran into difficulties after complaints were made to the Central Board of Film Censors by people. Objections were raised over the content after its release. Some protests and concerns allegedly pushed the authorities to ban the film to avoid a backlash.
The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting then issued a notification on November 11 and noted, “Written complaints were received that the film contains highly objectionable material which does not conform with the social values and moral standards of our society and is repugnant to the norms of ‘decency and morality as laid down in Section 9 of the Motion Picture Ordinance, 1979′. The story revolves around a ‘patriarchal family’ wanting to have a baby boy to continue the family line. The youngest son of the family joins an erotic dance theatre secretly. He then falls for a transgender person.
The fundamentalists in the country have deemed the movie as anti-Islam. Senator Mushtaq Ahmad Khan of Jamaat-e-Islami in the Pakistan Senate said in a tweet, “Pakistan is an Islamic country, and no law, ideology or activity can be allowed against.” Joyland was the first Pakistani movie to be screened at Cannes Film Festival. It won the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize and Queer Palm award at the festival. Further, it was screened at Toronto International Film Festival and the Busan International Film Festival.
The film has been written and directed by Saim Sadiq and has been produced by Apoorva Guru Charan, Sarmad Sultan Khoosat, and Lauren Mann. The film has been shot in Lahore and features Ali Junejo, Rasti Farooq, Alina Khan, Sarwat Gillani, Salman Peerzada, Sohail Sameer, and Sania Saeed.
