Film ban upheld

Press, 16 June 1979, Page 6

Film ban upheld

PA Wellington The Fim Censorship Board of Review has refused to lift the ban on the film “The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart” because, in the board’s opinion, its depiction of the drug scene could injure the public good. The low-budget American film, made in 1969, was banned by the Chief Censor (Mr B. C. Tunnicliffe). The review board’s unanimous decision was published in the Gazette yesterday. The board’s chairman (Mr A. B. Beatson) said the film was a plotless depiction of an earnest, non-smoking film student who had yet to work out a stance on vice, particularly vice as represented by the world of drugs and drug-taking. “The board was of the opinion that the film presented sufficient evidence of anti-social behaviour to consider the film likely to be injurious to the public good,” Mr Beatson said. It was hard to escape the conclusion that the drug scene in which the young hero, Stanley, became increasingly involved was glamourised by the makers of the film, he said.