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Monster Hunter Still Banned From Cinemas Despite Removal of Racist Scene


Credit: Sony Pictures Entertainment

Monster Hunter has officially been banned from cinemas in China for an apparent racist scene. We reported over the weekend that the action-fantasy film starring Milla Jovovich based on the hit Capcom video game has been pulled from Chinese theaters due to one scene that was deemed inappropriate by its viewers and is downright offensive to Chinese people in general.


According to a report from the good folks over at Variety, the controversial scene sees an exchange between Jin Au-Yeung aka MC Jin and a white male actor. Describing the sequence, the report writes: "In the scene, a white male character and an Asian character played by Jin are driving together at high speed. 'What?' says the former. 'Look at my knees!' shouts Jin. 'What kind of knees are these?' asks his companion. 'Chi-nese!' jokes Jin, punning on the word's last syllable."

That tasteless joke alone received a ton of backlash which resulted in the film's removal from cinemas. In the heat of the controversy (via Variety), Constantin Film has already issued an apology, stating that it was never their intention to "discriminate, insult or otherwise offend anyone of Chinese heritage." The production company added, "Constantin Film has listened to the concerns expressed by Chinese audiences and removed the line that has led to this inadvertent misunderstanding."

Aside from the apology, Constantin Film has deleted the racist scene from the film in hopes of making amends with their Chinese audience. Unfortunately, that isn't enough to change their decision and as it stands, cinemas still aren't going to screen the film and its online presence has permanently been blocked. Ouch.

As unfortunate as it may seem, this should serve as a valuable lesson not only for Constantin Film but also to the other major production outfits to be mindful of the jokes they'll include in their releases, especially jokes about race.

Monster Hunter is scheduled for global release on December 30.

Also Read: Milla Jovovich Fights Massive Dragons in First Trailer for Monster Hunter

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