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British filmmakers are being encouraged to cut sex scenes in their movies
to protect actors from Covid-19,
but the ridiculous suggestion is just an excuse to censor art and expression.Directors UK, a professional association of directors in Britain, which has more than 7,000 members, has unleashed
'Intimacy in the Time of Covid-19' - new recommendations for filmmakers returning to productions in the midst of the current pandemic. Put together by board members Susanna White and Bill Anderson, and 'intimacy coordinator' Vanessa Coffey, the guidelines are the latest fear-mongering nonsense to have dropped as a result of coronavirus.
The most alarming section of the pamphlet is the "narrative alternatives" bit, about depicting sex scenes. The recommendations are
not only ill thought out, but also essentially
encourage the rewinding of the clock by more than a few decades and returning to the talkies of the 30s, when the
Hays Code banned the portrayal of sex and other morally dubious activities onscreen.
Instead of actually showing scenes of intimacy,
filmmakers are now being encouraged to show only the before-and-after moments book-ending the act. One could show a bedroom door closing, the guidelines suggest, and then leave everything "up to the viewer's imagination," or characters could be seen "fixing their own clothes/re-dressing after the event."
And in truly bizarre Covid-19 fashion, "sexting" and intimate video chats are suggested as replacements for physically intimate scenes.
Comment: There are worse storms brewing in the US than these, the ramifications of which promise to be epic.