CyBC considers new showing of censored film

By Andrew Adamides

THOSE desperate to know what happened at the end of Body Language, the sexy TV movie cut short by CyBC last Friday night, may now get a chance to see the outcome, as the state broadcaster is considering reshowing the film in its entirety.

In a statement issued yesterday, CyBC apologised to its viewers, saying it had received many complaints both about the film’s content and about its truncated ending.

It also confirmed a report in yesterday’s Cyprus Mail saying an inquiry had been ordered into the matter.

Body Language stars Tom Berenger as a lawyer obsessed with stripper Heidi Seinz. The film includes scenes of them having sex in a packed department store, her stripping, and Berenger’s screen wife Nancy Travis topless in her kitchen.

A CyBC previewer passed the film as acceptable for the 9pm slot in which it was shown, without warnings.

But so great was the number of complaints that the Presentation Officer on duty decided to cut the film after just one hour, replacing it with an old Greek comedy scheduled for CyBC2 that evening but shunted aside by the live budget debate at the House of Representatives.

Body Language is a made-for-cable film and hence is more explicit than the average TV film. It had never been shown in Cyprus before.

If CyBC does decide to show it again, it will probably be in a later slot, with warnings about the film’s nature.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.