The Kite Runner — is it safe for all audiences, or should it be restricted?

The ratings in British Columbia are almost always more lenient than the ratings in the United States. Many films that get R ratings south of the border are rated 14-A up here, and some are even rated PG — usually because the only thing “objectionable” about them is the four-letter words or a few seconds of nudity.

Occasionally, however, a film will get a slightly stricter rating up here. Disney’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996; my comments), for example, was rated G in the U.S. and PG in B.C. — but since both ratings are purely advisory and carry no age restrictions, the difference doesn’t really matter.

Today, however, for the first time that I can recall, I came across a film that got a PG-13 in the U.S. and an 18-A in B.C. In other words, anyone can see the film without a guardian in the United States, while British Columbians will be unable to see the film unless they have adult accompaniment or are adults themselves.

And what is the film in question? It is The Kite Runner, adapted by Marc Forster from the novel by Khaled Hosseini.

Here is the American rating:

Rated PG-13 for strong thematic material including the sexual assault of a child, violence and brief strong language.

And here is how the website for the B.C. Film Classification board explains the reasons behind the 18-A rating:

The following were determinative to the classification decision:

1. Scene of sexual violence involving minors.

In addition to the foregoing content, classifiers noted the following:

1. Scenes of violence including beatings and a stoning;
2. Depiction of a person hit in the eye with a projectile;
3. Nine instances of coarse language including blasphemy and derogatory references to sexual orientation.

And just for comparison’s sake, the Ontario Film Review Board has rated the film 14-A but makes no reference to rape or sexual assault or the involvement of minors, speaking only vaguely of:

Content Advisories:

– COARSE LANGUAGE
– VIOLENCE
– DISTURBING CONTENT

Detailed Observations:

– Coarse language
– Slurs
– Occasional upsetting or disturbing scenes
– sexual innuendo
– Occasional portrayals of graphic violence

As it happens, the pivotal scene in question recently prompted the distributor to delay the film’s release, for the sake of its young co-stars. Two weeks ago, the New York Times reported:

The studio distributing “The Kite Runner,” a tale of childhood betrayal, sexual predation and ethnic tension in Afghanistan, is delaying the film’s release to get its three schoolboy stars out of Kabul — perhaps permanently — in response to fears that they could be attacked by Afghans angered by the film’s culturally inflammatory rape scene. . . .

The Taliban destroyed nearly all movie theaters in Afghanistan, but pirated DVDs often arrive soon after a major film’s release in the West. As a result, Paramount Vantage, the art-house and specialty label of Paramount Pictures, has pushed back the release of the $18 million movie by six weeks, to Dec. 14, when the young stars’ school year will have ended. . . .

Ms. Dowd and E. Bennett Walsh, a producer, said they met in Kabul with Ahmad Khan’s father, Ahmad Jaan Mahmoodzada, and told him that his son’s character was the victim of a “vicious sexual assault.” Mr. Mahmoodzada seemed unmoved, they said, remarking that “bad things happen” in movies as in life. The boy, they continued, did not receive a script until a Dari translation was available on the set in western China. The rape scene was rehearsed twice, they said, once with the father present.

On Tuesday the elder Mr. Mahmoodzada, reached by cellphone, rejected this account, and said he never learned the rape was a plot point until the scene was about to be shot. He also said his son never received a script.

Mr. Forster said that during rehearsals he considered including a shot of Hassan’s pants being pulled down, exposing his backside, and that neither Ahmad Khan nor his father objected. But the morning the scene was to be filmed, Mr. Forster found the boy in tears. Ahmad Khan said he did not want to be shown nude, Mr. Forster agreed to skip that shot, and the boy went ahead with the rape scene. Mr. Mahmoodzada confirmed this.

In the final version of the film, the rape is conveyed impressionistically, with the unstrapping of a belt, the victim’s cries and a drop of blood. . . .

So, apparently there is nothing in this scene that is so explicit that it would earn more than a purely advisory PG-13 rating in the States … and apparently the scene is suitable for unaccompanied teenagers in Ontario … but apparently the scene is also disturbing enough, at least within the context of the film, that it merits a restrictive 18-A rating in British Columbia. I guess the classifiers here take this sort of subject matter a lot more seriously.

UPDATE: This gets weirder. I just remembered that Lou Lumenick of the New York Post noted the other day that The Kite Runner “is being marketed to families with a giveaway competition for organizers of fan clubs”. Marketed to families, yet in some regions the film has the equivalent of an American R rating. Bizarre.