Catherine Breillat's Fat Girl (A Ma Soeur!) has been banned by Ontario Film Review Board (OFRB). According to Noah Cowan, co-president of Cowboy Booking which is co-releasing the film with Lions Gate in North America, the OFRB requested cuts that would have reduced the movie to a mere 40 minutes in length from its original 93 minute running time.
The scenes under dispute include full-frontal nudity of adolescent females, particularly a central episode where a 13-year-old girl watches her older teenage sister engaged in a sex act with a man. Other disputed sequences include a scene with the 13-year-old looking at her breasts in a mirror, and another where her breasts are exposed in what an OFRB spokesperson described as, "a fairly brutal rape scene."
In a radio interview, Cowan said the OFRB's decision denies adults in Ontario the right to make a decision for themselves about seeing an important art film. He said that the film's subject matter, the sexuality of young females, and Breillat's handling of it, may be offensive to some but no more so than eviscerated bodies may be to others.
The film, which screened at this year's Toronto International Film Festival, has been passed uncut in the province of Quebec (Canadian provinces have individual jurisdiction over film certification). Fat Girl also recently passed uncut in the UK.
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