The ROC Ministry of Culture is preparing to amend the Motion Picture Act, eliminating obsolete and restrictive regulations governing Taiwan’s film industry.
“Martial law was lifted more than 20 years ago, but many regulatory frameworks are still out of sync with social realities,” MOC Minister Lung Ying-tai said April 24, adding that outdated rules must be revised.
Article 1, for example, states that the law was formulated to allow film art “to disseminate Chinese culture, expound national policy, fulfill its social educational function, and advocate healthy recreation.”
Article 3 requires that the person responsible for a movie company must have at least a high school education, while Article 26 stipulates that a motion picture “shall not harm the national interest or ethnic dignity, violate national policy or government laws and regulations, incite others to commit crime or violate the law … slander ancient sages and virtuous historical figures [or] distort historical facts.”
Such regulations were once used as a means of social control, Lung said, “but they have no real meaning today, and run counter to Taiwan’s open and progressive spirit.”
As movies are no longer propaganda tools and filmmakers should be given freedom to create their art, “the proposed amendments amount to the complete abolition of censorship,” she said.
“But the revisions are not a form of indulgence,” Lung stressed. “Rather, we hope they tally with the core values of social advancement.” (THN)
Write to Grace Kuo at mlkuo@mofa.gov.tw