The first Indo-Australian movie, UnIndian, which will soon be released in India and Middle East has had a run-in with India’s censor board.
The film starring Australian cricketer Brett Lee and acclaimed actress Tannishtha Chatterjee, is a rom-com highlighting two different cultures.
The film that was shot in Sydney follows Brett Lee’s character, Will who falls for a divorced single-mom who is constantly pestered to marry a ‘nice Indian man’.
But before its release in India, Indian daily Mumbai Mirror reported that the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) has asked the film’s director Anupam Sharma to cut 65 seconds of a lovemaking sequence between Lee and Tannishtha.
"It is a beautiful scene where they make love for the first time. At the same time, Tannishtha's parents are watching a spiritual leader on TV speak about opening your chakras. The music escalates as the sequences set in the two different settings unfold. It is artistically shot but the Indian Censor Board wants it to be cut," Sharma told the daily.
"We have been asked to only show Lee's side profile and not his back and to remove the spiritual context. That's like ripping off the film's heartbeat," Sharma says.
