I had a "blue moon" type of a lazy day today, which saw me let off early today to roam Orchard Road for a bit before dinner. And just in time to catch this movie in the late afternoon.
When I first heard about this show, the controversies surrounding the
ban seem pretty serious - 20 out of 24 advisory panels who felt the comments were distasteful and demeaning must have been quite substantial and justifiable to call for it not to be shown, no?
Until I watched the movie, which regretfully, the controversial bits in the second story "Porn Masala" were voided out with just Adrian Pang yammering in silence, which i then compared with the clip on the
youtube preview.
I wonder what was going through the production team's mind when they decide to push the boundary, but I have heard worse. We have a common joke when still in the blue, that certain offenses are predominantly "prerogatives" of particular races - the gamblers, the drug addicts, the wife beaters/drunkards. More often than not, it is backed up by historical and current data; we would be blind or super naive to think otherwise.
Of course, racial sensitivities have always been an issue in Singapore. Friendly jibes aside, again, we would be super naive to think that we can be hanky-dory if we start throwing racial slurs about, which may finally bordering on personal insult, someone takes offense, and it just takes an innocent spark for a normal jibe traded escalate to events that may lead to greater racial divide driven by distrust. It goes back to the primordial instinct of having to preserve one self, and following thus, one's self worth and all the things one identifies him or herself with. Just remember the outcries when the
Chinese student called Singaporeans "dogs" (when I was wondering what the boy could have encountered to spit that comment, I can only so imagine all the mainland ah-tiong jokes and insults that could have been thrown his way).
And perhaps that was the reason why the 20 panel members were playing the safe cards, that the slurs in "Porn Masala" could indeed offend fellow Indians if taken too seriously, and thus need not be shown here to incite any displeasure to start with. Not that the accolades of the film helped - although there could be indian communities in those countries, I wonder if these were indie film selection with a limited audience, hence the potential lash-back was kept to a minimal. And even if there were Indians who had watched the film, could those be discerning viewers who understood that certain artistic discretion had to given to deliver the idea across?
Coming back to the movie. Do I think that the part was necessary? Yes. The punch was gone when the racist parts were removed. Would I have been offended if the insulted race was Chinese? I could be instinctively, if I had not understood that the insult had to be uttered in the movie for a purpose.
So rather than saying that Singaporeans are not mature for the show, let's not be too damning; but rather, that the movie needs mature audience to discern artistic license to convey the satire, and not for any ordinary man-on-the-street, easily offended or the faint hearted. Will there ever be a time when such racial slurs in a movie like Sex.Violence.Family Values will never raise any eyebrows? How about never, until we have to share the spaces with another organism such that we see fellow human as closer brothers and brothers, than let's say, aliens. But well, that could be my pessimism at its best.
Anyhow, I think the controversies very much mar the essence of the whole movie, which airs the "dirty little ditties" of squeaky clean Singapore. Witty, funny, never a dull moment. We need to loosen up a little!
