15 Movies Banned Overseas For Ridiculous Reasons

By Jack Pooley /

12. The "Gay Moment" - Beauty & The Beast (2017)

Disney

The Reason: For a "gay moment" in which LeFou (Josh Gad) dances with another man (Kuwait and Malaysia).

Advertisement

Wasn't this a whole lot of nothing? In the lead-up to Beauty and the Beast's release, word spread online that the film featured a brief gay interaction between LeFou and another man, which had LGBT activists praising Disney (until they saw the film, anyway), while causing the film to be banned in both Kuwait and Malaysia.

To Disney's credit, they weren't cowed by Malaysia's request for cuts, and their firm standing led to the film eventually being released uncut in the country.

Advertisement

Ultimately, even if you accept the homophobes on their own terms, this was blown wildly out of proportion.

LeFou dances with a man for about three seconds at the end of the movie, and any other nods to the character being gay are surface-level innuendo at most, to the extent that many LGBT advocates ended up criticising Disney for playing coy with LeFou's sexuality.

Advertisement