What kind of film do you want to watch on Good Friday? In Germany your options are limited.
ADVERTISEMENTIn the mood this holiday season to watch some classics like Heidi, Batman, Ghostbusters, or Dumb and Dumber? Well, you won’t be able to watch them in Germany on Good Friday.
A versatile list of action, horror, comedy, thriller, drama and family movies are among more than 700 films banned from screening in public cinemas during the Christian holiday.
Since the 1950s public cinemas have been regulated over what films they can screen during so-called “silent holidays”. Movies that have been deemed to violate religious or moral sentiment have been added to the list for decades.
The list of silent holidays varies by state, although almost all include Good Friday.
In the early years of the blacklist, more than half of the movies released every year were included. As decades passed, regulations loosened up, leaving fewer than 1% of all feature films released nowadays ending up banned.
Here is a small selection:
Batman (1980), Bruce Lee (1980), Monty Python's Life of Brian (1980), Conan the Barbarian (1982), Scream (1982), Halloween (1982), The Boogey Man (1983), The Terminator (1985), Robocop (1987), Mad Max (1988), Cheech & Chong (1989), Ghostbusters (1990), Robocop (1987 ), Mary Poppins (1995), Blade (1998), Heidi (2001), Jackass (2003), Dumb and Dumber 2 (2003), Saw IV (2008), Final Destination 5 (2011)