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BBFC

Paddington Bear embroiled in sex row as author clashes with BBFC

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By John Glenday, Reporter

November 19, 2014 | 1 min read

A cinematic reboot of the Paddington Bear franchise has found itself at the heart of a ratings row after the British Board of Film Classification issued guidance for ‘mild sex references’ – only to later downgrade their description to mere ‘innuendo’.

The U-turn followed interventions on behalf of the distributor and Paddington author Michael Bond, who professed ‘amazement’ at the BBFC’s initial guidance.

The big screen interpretation was initially handed a PG rating owing to content including "dangerous behaviour, mild threat, mild sex references and mild bad language" but this was subsequently revised to ‘dangerous behaviour, mild threat, innuendo, [and] infrequent mild bad language’ on appeal.

Justifying their concerns the BBFC pointed to a ‘comic sequence’ in which a man dressed as a woman is flirted with by another man’ and a single instance of the word ‘bloody’ being mumbled by an on screen character.

Hugh Bonneville, Sally Hawkins, Peter Capaldi and Nicole Kidman all star in the film which is released on 28 November.

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