BRUNO gets slapped with an NC-17 on first attempt
Lord knows how Sacha Baron Cohen got away with an R rating for Borat a few years back, a movie lest we not forget that for at least two minutes, contained the naked full frontal wrestling and dry humping of it's two leads. But the MPAA are wise to it this time and Cohen's follow-up Bruno, has been slapped with a NC-17 rating on it's first pass, the historic death rattle for a studio released film. Universal and Cohen are now re-cutting the comedy with plenty of time to get an approval before it's released in July, otherwise it won't hit a wide theatrical audience. One of the scenes in question is the graphic depiction of what appears to be anal sex from Cohen performed on another guy and Bruno's intrusion naked into the tent of an un-suspecting bystander during a hunting trip. Sarah Waxman at The Wrap reported yesterday that Cohen has already screened two different versions of his film this week in the hope of gaging how audiences will react to the multiple cuts but as well as the commercial potential of his film, he now has to worry about making it fit within the MPAA requirements. Remind me again why the MPAA exist and employs people to actually make the decisions on what we should "morally" be allowed to see in our cinema when so many worthwhile jobs have been cut in the past few months?