Beijing festival pulls Call Me By Your Name amid content clamp-down

The movie, which won a screenplay Oscar this month, waswithdrawn from the Beijing International Film Festival set forApril, Sony Pictures Entertainment told Reuters, declining tocomment on the reason.

Homosexuality is not illegal in China, but activists sayconservative attitudes in some sections of society have led tooccasional government clamp-downs.

In July last year, a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender(LGBT) conference in the western city of Chengdu was called offafter the venue cancelled the booking, citing conflicting events.

Lesbian dating app Rela was also shut down last May. A blacklist of banned audiovisual online content last yearalso controversially included homosexuality, underlining along-standing attitude in China towardsame-sex relationsdespite often thriving gay scenes in major cities.

Tightening grip on media content

The pulling of Call Me By Your Namealso comes as Chinatightens its grip on media content. Parliament this month votedto scrap term limits for President Xi Jinping and hand controlover film, news and publishing to the Communist Party'spublicity department.

The film follows the summer romance in Italy between a17-year-old boy and an older student. It was pulled after thescreening proposal submitted was not approved by regulators, aperson with knowledge of the matter said.

In an initial screening list dated March 16, the organiserhad listed Call Me By Your Namealong with other foreign filmslike Lean on Peteand art parody The Square.

The festival organizer declined to comment. Reuters couldn'treach China's State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio,Film and Television.

"This movie is in deviation from the policy environment inChina," said Wu Jian, a Beijing-based film analyst, adding thatit was "quite embarrassing for China" that it had been pulled.

China has long censored violence or sexual content in filmreleases, with a growing focus on socialist core values. Filmswith gay themes have met with a mixed reaction with some banned,though others have been given the go-ahead.

"There is no clear policy on this issue, so we are alwaysconfused," said Xin Ying, executive director of the Beijing LGBTCentre, adding that following the recent reshuffle of the mediaregulators it was getting even harder to get clear direction.