Hubble bubble, Macbeth's in trouble as Thailand bans film

Director of 'Shakespeare Must Die' Ing Kanjanavanit holds up a DVD the banned movie (AP)

Film censors in Thailand have stepped in to ban a film based on William Shakespeare's Macbeth, claiming it could inflame political tensions.

In a move that has been interpreted as the latest effort by authorities to protect the monarchy from possible criticism, censors said the film contained content that "causes divisiveness among the people of the nation".

The Thai-language film Shakespeare Must Die tells the story of a theatre group in a fictional country resembling Thailand that is staging a production of Macbeth. Ing K, the film's director, told the Associated Press that the censorship committee objected to anti-monarchy overtones in the film as well as politically charged content, including a scene based on a photograph from Bangkok's 1976 student uprising showing a demonstrator being lynched.

"The committee questioned why we wanted to bring back violent pain from the past to make people angry," she said.

The director called the ruling absurd and said it was a reflection of what has happened to Thai society in recent years.