Horror movies not allowed anymore in China

BEIJING (Reuters) - China has added ghosts, monsters and other things that go bump in the night to its list of banned video and audio content in an intensified crackdown ahead of the Beijing Olympics.

Producers have around three weeks to look through their tapes for "horror" and report it to authorities, the General Administration of Press and Publications said in a statement posted on the government Web site.

Offending content included "wronged spirits and violent ghosts, monsters, demons, and other inhuman portrayals, strange and supernatural storytelling for the sole purpose of seeking terror and horror," the administration said.

The new guidelines aim to "control and cleanse the negative effect these items have on society, and to prevent horror, violent, cruel publications from entering the market through official channels and to protect adolescents' psychological health."

The regulations suggest China, where graphic, pirated sex and horror movies are available on most street corners, is keen to step up its control of the cultural arena ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August, which are widely seen as a coming-out party for the rising political and economic power.

They come just weeks after Beijing clamped down on "vulgar" video and audio content, slapped restrictions on Internet sites and handed down a two-year film-making ban to the team behind the steamy "Lost in Beijing."

(Reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Nick Macfie and Alex Richardson)

To my surprise a lot of parents suppport that ban.

I heard Shrek was banned. If Shrek qualifies as an horror movie...

wow shrek qualifies as a horror movie?!!  maybe it's just a temporary ban until after the olympics.

Yes everything seems to be done with the Olympics in mind nowadays, in Beijing. This include some say cleaning up the place of the Blacks 

Those at the Communist Propaganda Departments that control the media in China are well-known small-minded intellectual dwarfs. They are like Chinese version of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell.

Some foolish officials might be unable to understand Shrek and thought it was kinky for a princess marrying a pig. The fairytale is too deep for them to comprehend. 

> Yes everything seems to be done with the Olympics in mind nowadays, in Beijing. This include some say cleaning up the place of the Blacks

I don't think it is subjected to the place of the blacks but wherever is not considered presentable normally related to  "illegal and none-permanent city residents" that includes mostly migrant workers, businessmen, people for legal appeals, homeless, et al. The government does that ALL THE TIME before important holiday and important national/international  events.  When I went to school in Beijing, they even delayed the semester start at universities. It's just typical of their paranoia.   

I was reading China Daily the other day where there was a story featuring some officials talking proudly about their successes in shutting down porn sites, arresting people etc. 

I laughed so hard at the darn thing coz i had just discovered a real juicy porn site that very day.

Those government chaps have to get a reality check,...u just cant control the the internet!

U shut down one site another fills its spot straight away!

You have to look at the "bigger picture".  Violent images make people excited, when people are excited they want to have sex, when they have sex they make babies.  It's all about population control.  haha!  If you treat people like children and get them to think they are children then maybe they won't do adult things...ie "Getting their ugly on".

From the latest news Shrek (as well as Harry Potter, Toy Story) have been exempted from the ban. Someone must have been lobbying in Beijing...

More seriously I don't think the ban actually matters because the DVDs, banned or not, will be found in the streets anyway

Instead of listing down the things that are banned in China, maybe they should tell us what's NOT banned here.

The thing China should do is to rate the movies. Now China has no rate system, all movies on the show are for every ages of people.

The thing China should do is to rate the movies. Now China has no rate system, all movies on the show are for every ages of people.

EXACTLY!