“It might well be, given that Professor Ian Refalo has agreed to take on a constitutional case against the ban. But then again, I know at least one other Ian Refalo. I somehow don’t think the lawyer would be posting comments like ‘Talk about big brother!’.”

I have put The Times website to the test, as it were. I posted a non-controversial comment to a non-controversial letter but using a false name (J.Borg), a false email address and a false telephone number. Nobody checked and it was published. (http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090216/letters/what-to-do-at-dock-1).

I just wanted to prove that it is possible to use a false name to post a comment on that website and this could be the case with the comment attributed (possibly) to Dr Ian Refalo.

It is true that Dr Refalo could ask the manager of the website to remove a comment if it was necessary but suppose he is unaware that a comment has been posted using his name. I hate ranting but have to say this: whoever is running The Times’s website seems not to have the necessary experience to know how much malice and cunning people display when they want to deceive, especially online.

Ian Refalo (5 hours, 26 minutes ago)
The question that needs to be asked is whether the “Board of Film and Stage Certification” has the right to censor in the first place. As far as I understand it, its remit is to certify, and certify only. Fine, put a nice big AO sign on every bit of advertising, make it amply clear that there are scenes that can offend public morals, and so forth, but leave it at that. Talk about big brother!

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090216/local/stitching-is-an-insult-from-beginning-to-end-board-chairman.

I have looked up the Cinema and Stage Regulations and there is no reference to BANNING stage performances. The legal notice states:

“It shall be the function of the Board to classify films andstage productions on the basis of guidelines to be drawn up by the Board based on the following main criteria:
(a) the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults; and
(b) the literary, artistic or educational merit, if any, of the production; and
(c) the general character of the production including
whether it is of medical, legal or scientific character;
and
(d) the person or class of persons to whom it is intended or
by whom the production is likely to be viewed.

I wonder whether Ms Friggieri, in her eagerness to ensure the law is observed, has actually exceeded her powers…

[Daphne – It might well be, given that Professor Ian Refalo has agreed to take on a constitutional case against the ban. But then again, I know at least one other Ian Refalo. I somehow don’t think the lawyer would be posting comments like ‘Talk about big brother!’.]

“The Maltese media regulation is predominantly characterised by a traditional command and control approach taken by the state and expressed by means of legislation.”

This is how an official interim report drafted in Hamburg looks at our system. We can snub it as a pseudo-intellectual claim and perhaps even argue that our system is endemic and should be respected as such. But seeing the rest of Europe thinking otherwise, putting it in a different perspective, should at least make you think outside an island environment, look at traditional regulation vis-a-vis globalisation. The same report concludes:

“Moreover, traditional regulation does not seem to stimulate creative activities effectively. Initiatives, innovation and commitment cannot be imposed by law
Given that modern regulation has to rely on co-operation with the objects of regulation to achieve its objectives, this is becoming another significant factor.”

I’m not going to contribute to the debate of whether this play is obscene or vulgar or high art as the narrow-mindedness on this island has quite shocked me. All I’ll say is that the play IS a beautiful, tragic, love story. Watch it – don’t watch it – doesn’t make a difference. It is what it is. And it WILL be shown – that’s a promise.

Your comparison between Daniel Day Lewis and Roberto Benigni is out of place. They are both brilliant in their own genres. One is a brilliant dramatic actor and the other is a brilliant comedian who recites Dante to packed theatres, sports arenas and city squares all over Italy. We had the good fortune to see him at the university. You must have missed him. Otherwise you would not write him off as a cafe-comic. But then again, tastes are subjective.

[Daphne – Humour is not subjective as such, but it is linked entirely to culture. No, I don’t find Benigni remotely interesting or entertaining, still less amusing or hilarious. His kind of humour leaves me cold. On the other hand, I have just been rereading David Sedaris and crying silently with laughter. Before you ask, he’s American, not British. It just doesn’t translate into Italian and if Roberto Benigni were to read Sedaris, I suspect he just wouldn’t get it. It’s deadpan, you see, and the Italians just don’t do deadpan, but it’s pretty much the only kind of humour that works for me. Primo Levi killed himself after battling depression for most of his life, so I suppose there weren’t that many moments of humour in Auschwitz, and if there were, then it would have been black humour, but I suppose Benigni doesn’t get that, either. You repeat, I repeat: read that piece in The Guardian. What the writer is saying between the lines is “Here is a self-obsessed ridiculous little man who thinks he’s the dogs’ bollocks and who believes I’m going to find him amusing because he gesticulates, hams up the foreignness and blows raspberries, and who has brought his adoring wife along to praise him in that embarrassing over-the-top way that people like Italians do, and who, for some reason, has met with widespread approval outside his native Italy, God knows why- but you know, his film is ‘wonderful’ (I had to say that, because there are limits).]

Benigni was applauded in Israel for La Vita e’ Bella , he wasn’t crude his work was sublime.
“…….as the credits rolled, everyone in the cinema – including Holocaust survivors – leapt to their feet and gave him a standing ovation.” http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/137217.stm

[Daphne – I didn’t post any comments on his blog; that’s why you can’t find them. I said that I didn’t know where to begin, and I really don’t. Some of the issues are so fundamental, such truisms, that it wearies me to even think of going through them again. I just can’t believe he is approaching the matter from the very dangerous stand-point of ‘I don’t agree with it, I disapprove of it, therefore I will ban it.’ The next step, logically, is banning political ideas you don’t agree with/don’t approve of, ditto with religious ideas, cultural forms, ‘destabilising influences’ and so on. It’s really no different to the Soviets banning plays that gave a favourable impression of life and democracy in the west, but Fr Joe doesn’t seem able to see that, strangely. Nor is it any different to the stance taken by certain Islamic states in banning performances that cause ‘offence to Islam’. We look down on that kind of behaviour then do the same ourselves.

You are welcome to your views about Benigni and his film. There is a welter of criticism from people who view both him and his film as I do. Check the internet, but go for the reputable media sites. I’ve posted some links beneath an addendum to Ray Borg’s comment. My favourite is the description of him in The Guardian. I suppose Benigni just doesn’t translate into British culture, and I’m not surprised at that. I can’t see Stephen Fry translating into Italian culture, either. It might be the reason why those Maltese people who think Benigni is brilliant rather than irritating and totally up his own backside are the ones who are immured in what they think is Italian culture, but is only a peculiarly Maltese view of it, coloured by politics and prejudice.]

Totally agree. A clown. Walking on the chairbacks at the Oscars? Soooo Sunday afternoon Italian TV.

[Daphne – And turning up wearing doss-down clothes to a ceremony at which he was given an honorary doctorate by the University of Malta, then tumbling down the steps (oh ha ha jolly ha, hysterical) and landing at the president’s feet? Such fun. I imagine you have to be a (certain kind of) Italian to appreciate the humour.]

Here are some samples of what eminet film critics had to say about the film:
“Life Is Beautiful” is not about Nazis and Fascists, but about the human spirit. It is about rescuing whatever is good and hopeful from the wreckage of dreams. About hope for the future. About the necessary human conviction, or delusion, that things will be better for our children than they are right now.

Roger Ebert – Chicago –Sun Times

Benigni effectively creates a situation in which comedy is courage. And he draws from this an unpretentious, enormously likable film that plays with history both seriously and mischievously. Piety has no place here, nor do tears until the final reel. “Life is Beautiful” plays by its own rules.
Janet Maslin – New York Times

It’s an ambitious film by an exceptional comic talent. It’s a sincere effort, not an ego trip by a performer trying to expand his range, and there are moments that are genuinely funny, and others that are harrowing. –

Mick La Salle San Francisco Chronicle

I know that tastes are subjective and there is no arguing your likes and dislikes but to write off “La vita e` bella” as “offensively frivolous material” is a little bit too much.

[Daphne – You don’t know me if you think that I feel distaste for ‘anything Italian’. There are very few aspects of Italian culture for which I feel distaste, but they are major ones, including the inability to deal with reality, which means that it is invariably coated in ten layers of melodramatic honey, as epitomised by this particular film. And Benigni is an immensely irritating person who thinks of himself as an amusing person, and it shows. People who go around thinking ‘I am so amusing’ rarely are. And yes, he is definitely a try-hard poor imitation of Woody Allen. He even tries to look that way.

And here’s a sensible American:
http://bostonreview.net/BR24.2/stone.html

Which foul language?

[Daphne – Why on earth would you want all the high-camp drama of excommunication? Can’t you just stop being a Catholic?]