Censor Watch

It is not only the British parliament that is clamouring to control their subjects via an identity verification requirement fo social media users. Governments are=round the world are doubling their efforts to end online anonymity by proposing and introducing new laws that force users to hand over their identity documents (IDs) to use social media and by framing online anonymity as something that needs to be eradicated.

While most of these government efforts to end online anonymity have been widely covered in the media, America's recent proposals have managed to stay out of the spotlight. But despite flying under the radar, these proposals do exist in a discussion draft that was introduced by Congressman John Curtis in May.

The discussion draft aims to require a provider of a social media service to verify the identity of users of the service, and for other purposes and prevent anyone from creating a social media account without verifying their identity.

Not only does this discussion draft intend to make ID verification mandatory for anyone who wants to create a social media account but it also wants to force social media companies to report users to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) whenever they suspect users have submitted fake IDs. Additionally, it contains a requirement for the FTC to submit these reports to the United States (US) Department of Justice (DOJ).

While the discussion draft does include an exception for social media providers that have annual revenues of less than $1 billion for three consecutive years, the large social media platforms where the vast majority of the more than three billion total social media users are registered will be forced to verify the real identity of their users.

The National Gallery has removed a picture from an upcoming major exhibition from its website over claims of antisemitic portrayal of Jews.

Albrecht Dürer's Christ Among the Doctors from 1509 depicts a story from the Gospel according to Luke of Jesus on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem for Passover, alongside a caricature of Jewish men from the synagogue.

The National Gallery had initially displayed the artwork prominently on its website advertising the upcoming exhibition without mentioning its portrayal of Jews. After the gallery was alerted to the fact by Jewish News reader Ralph Harris, it removed the picture online and highlighted the antisemitic representation in its gallery. A spokesperson said:

We are aware that the representation of the Doctors may cause offence and both the wall texts and the audio guide in the exhibition will acknowledge and address caricature and antisemitic portrayal in the painting.

We have removed the image and accompanying text from our online gallery of selected exhibited works as we felt that in this format there was not adequate space for the interpretation required for this work.

The Phantom Of The Open is a 2021 UK comedy drama by Craig Roberts
Starring Rhys Ifans, Sally Hawkins and Mark Rylance

The story of golfer Maurice Flitcroft whose performance at the 1976 British Open Golf Championship made him a legend.

Exists in 2 versions. The Phantom Of The Open was cut for BBFC 12A rated cinema release in 2021.  The Fantastic Flitcrofts is uncut and BBFC 15 rated for cinema release in 2021.

 

Versions

cut cut:   run: 103m pal: 99m		UK: Passed 12A for infrequent strong language: 2021 cinema release titled The Phantom Of The Open Cut to reduce strong language.
uncut run: 103m pal: 99m		UK: Passed 15 uncut for strong language: 2021 cinema release titled The Fantastic Flitcrofts

Police are investigating a banner unveiled by Crystal Palace fans before Saturday's football match with Newcastle.

The banner, depicting an image of Newcastle's new Saudi Arabian owners, PIF, about to behead a magpie as faceless fans in the background sang: We've got our club back, was unfurled by Palace supporters at Selhurst Park.

As well as the Premier League's chief executive, Richard Masters, giving a thumbs-up to a bag of money, it also listed offences that human rights organisations say the Saudi regime is responsible for, with a tick next to each one: terrorism, beheadings, civil rights abuse, murder, persecution and censorship.

A statement released by the Holmesdale Fanatics supporters group later said the Premier League had chosen money over morals in allowing the takeover.

A subsequent post from the official Croydon Metropolitan Police Twitter account read:

On Saturday 23 October police received a report of an offensive banner displayed by Crystal Palace fans. Officers are assessing the information and carrying out enquiries. Any allegations of racist abuse will be taken very seriously.

Offsite Comment: Listen, it is not racist to criticise Saudi Arabia

23rd October 2021. See article from spiked-online.com by Brendan O'Neill

Bad Luck Banging Or Loony Porn is a 2021 Romania/Luxembourg/Czech Republic/Croatia/Switzerland/UK comedy drama by Radu Jude
Starring Katia Pascariu, Claudia Ieremia and Olimpia Malai

Emi, a school teacher, finds her career and reputation under threat after a personal sex tape is leaked on the Internet. Forced to meet the parents demanding her dismissal, Emi refuses to surrender to their pressure. Radu Jude (Aferim!) delivers an incendiary mix of unconventional form, irreverent humor and scathing commentary on hypocrisy and prejudice in our societies.

The film was passed 18 by the BBFC with the note that it contains string real sex. It seems that the real sex caused problems for US distribution so it was cut.

Versions

Original Version run: 106m pal: 102m		UK: Passed 18 uncut with a BBFC trigger warning for strong real sex, nudity, sexually abusive behaviour, very strong language: 2021 Sovereign Film Distribution Limited VoD 2021 cinema release
cut US Version cut: 20m run: 86m pal: 83m		US: Cut for US theatrical distribution From IMDb. To get a public screening in the U.S., the distributor of the film decided to remove 20 minutes of footage from the film. As a result, the film will run for only 86 minutes in U.S. screenings.

Classic children's books in a Cambridge University archive will in future be labelled with trigger warnings for content relating to slavery, colonialism and racism.

Researchers are reviewing more than 10,000 books and magazines for authors from a previous era who have not referenced enslaved or colonised or denigrated people in the right away according to modern day mores.

The archive at Cambridge's Homerton College is being reviewed as part of a move to upload texts to a digital library. In online versions, words, phrases and images deemed harmful will be flagged and content warnings placed at the beginning of each text.

Targeted authors include Laura Ingalls Wilder, who wrote Little House On The Prairie , for her stereotypical depictions of Native Americans.

Another is Dr Theodor Seuss Geisel, author of the Dr Seuss books, for overt blackface and cultural insensitivities.

The Water Babies , Charles Kingsley's 1863 children's classic about a young chimney sweep, is described as having the potential to harm readers without warning for comments about Irish and black people.

The government has decided to counter terrorist knife murders by censoring the internet and taking away everyone's rights to (justifiably) insult their knee jerking MPs.

Writing in the Daily Mail, Nadine Dorries, Secretary of State for Digital Censorship Culture, Media and Sport said:

Online hate has poisoned public life, it's intolerable, it's often unbearable and it has to end.

Enough is enough. Social media companies have no excuses. And once this bill passes through Parliament, they will have no choice.

She also said the government had decided to re-examine how our legislation can go even further to ensure the biggest social media companies properly protect users from anonymous abuse.

Twitter is not impressed and has aired its concerns that the bill gives too much influence to the culture secretary over Ofcom.

The current draft bill would allow Dorries to change the Ofcom code of practice that would be used to regulate the likes of Facebook and Twitter.

Speaking to Radio 4's Westminster Hour programme, Katy Minshall,  the head of policy in the UK for Twitter, said the bill gave the minister unusual powers, leaving Ofcom to muddle through.

She also rejected the idea of stronger rules around online anonymity -- something some MPs have campaigned for. Minshall argued that clamping down on anonymous accounts would fail to deal with the problems of online abuse and could damage people who rely on pseudonymity. She said:

If you're a young person exploring their sexuality or you're a victim of domestic violence looking online for help and for support, pseudonymity is a really important safety tool for you.

She added that users already had to provide a date of birth, full name and email address when signing up, meaning that the police could access data about an account, even if someone had used a pseudonym.

Minshall said the bill had thrown up all sorts of really important questions, such as how do we define legal but harmful content and what sorts of exemptions should we make for journalistic content or content of democratic importance.

Instagram has started showing some users a popup message explaining that it will soon take away their ability to post links stickers, which many creators use to send their followers to other sites, digital stores, and platforms where they can make money.

Instagram doesn't allow adult content on its platform, but many adult content creators use it for promotional reasons, inviting their Instagram audience to follow them to other platforms or personal sites.

Link stickers are an option where users can add an external link to their photo or video. In August, Instagram removed the ability to link and send users off platform by swipe-up on a story and replaced it with a sticker, a small clickable icon that hovers over the image.

The Instagram popup warns:

Starting October 25, you will no longer have access to the link sticker because you have shared content that violates our Community Guidelines, the message said. There is no option to appeal this decision, only an OK button and a link to the Community Guidelines. Screenshot of the Instagram notification.

An Instagram spokesperson told Motherboard in a statement:

As part of our efforts to limit the spread of harmful content that violates our Community Guidelines, we'll restrict people who have repeatedly or severely violated these policies from using the link sticker. However, we're investigating an issue where people may have mistakenly been notified that they will be restricted, and we're working on resolving this as soon as possible.

Scream is a 1996 USA crime horror mystery by Wes Craven.
With Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox and David Arquette.      

A killer known as Ghostface begins killing off teenagers, and as the body count begins rising, one girl and her friends find themselves contemplating the "Rules" of horror films as they find themselves living in a real-life one.

The film has generally been released in the Theatrical Version that was cut in the US  for an MPAA R rating. There is an uncut Director's Cut but this has proved elusive.

Now James has observed that the recent UK Blu-ray Trilogy release contains the Director's Cut. He writes:

I have the UK blu-ray trilogy from 2020 and it's definitely the director's cut, even if it isn't advertised as such. I've attached pictures of 2 shots that are only in the directors cut.

Update: Disagreement

26th October 2021. Thanks to Mark

Re your article about the recent Scream Trilogy Blu-Ray containing the unrated cut of the first movie. Unfortunately after checking and comparing it to the original release which I also have, they are identical. You only see the aftermath of the first killing and not the actual spilling of the guts.

And Ramsey also notes that the Trilogy Blu-ray features the cut MPAA R rated version.

The Last Duel is a 2021 USA drama by Ridley Scott
Starring Matt Damon, Adam Driver and Jodie Comer

King Charles VI declares that Knight Jean de Carrouges settle his dispute with his squire by challenging him to a duel.

Passed BBFC 18 uncut for sexual violence, strong bloody violence

Last Night in Soho is a 2021 UK horror mystery thriller by Edgar Wright
Starring Anya Taylor-Joy, Thomasin McKenzie and Diana Rigg

In acclaimed director Edgar Wright's psychological thriller, Eloise, an aspiring fashion designer, is mysteriously able to enter the 1960s where she encounters a dazzling wannabe singer, Sandie. But the glamour is not all it appears to be and the dreams of the past start to crack and splinter into something far darker.

Passed BBFC 18 uncut for strong bloody violence

The Telegraph film critic Robbie Collin has written questioning whether the BBFC are being too strict in the 18 rating for the Last Due and Last Night in Soho:

Borrowing from Kurosawa's Rashomon, Scott depicts the events leading to the duel from his three protagonists' very different perspectives, a narrative device that comes into its own in the depiction of the rape itself. For Driver, the attack is a transaction: he sees something he wants and takes it, while assuming his victim accepts on some deep level this is just how things work. To Comer, it is unthinkably traumatising, but also chillingly banal. The fundamental horror of Driver's actions isn't couched in striking camera angles or lurid stylistic flourishes.

It's what developmental psychologists might describe as a teachable moment: the scene lays bare the mechanisms of sexual violence so frankly that you sense it could give its audience a greater understanding of the subject. But alas, one particular group that might especially benefit -- older teenage boys -- has been prevented from seeing it in the first place.

A few days later, the same classification was handed down to Edgar Wright's Last Night in Soho: another film that addresses sexual violence in ways that could be instructive -- as opposed to scarring -- for younger viewers.

...

But for Scott's and Wright's films to be made out of bounds to every member of a demographic for whom the issues they address might hold particular pertinence feels like the opposite of good moral sense. Understanding often follows discomfort: in fact, the discomfort is often what makes the understanding stick.

  Jules And Jim is a 1962 France romance by François Truffaut
Starring Jeanne Moreau, Oskar Werner and Henri Serre

There are no cuts issues with this release. The BBFC rating was originally 'X' in 1962, and then PG from 1991 until to 2008. BBFC have just increased the rating to 12A over new sensitivities about discrimination and sex references.

Summary Notes

In pre-WWI Paris, two friends, Jules (Austrian) and Jim (French), fall in love with the same woman, Catherine. But Catherine loves and marries Jules. When they meet again in Germany after the war, Catherine starts to love Jim - This is the story of three people in love, a love that doesn't affect their friendship, and about how their relationship evolves with the years.

Versions

uncut run: 106m pal: 102m		UK: Passed 12A uncut with a BBFC trigger warning for discrimination, moderate bad language, sex references: 2021 cinema release titled Jules Et Jim
uncut run: 105:56s pal: 101:42s		UK: Passed PG uncut for mild language, sex references and brief drug reference: 2008 cinema release titled Jules Et Jim 2006 Cinema Club video titled Jules Et Jim UK: Passed PG uncut: 2002 Tartan Video Ltd video titled Jules Et Jim 1993 Artificial Eye Film Co. Ltd VHS titled Jules Et Jim 1991 cinema release titled Jules Et Jim
uncut run: 106:00s pal: 101:46s		UK: Passed X (16) uncut: 1962 cinema release

Squid Game is a 2021 South Korea action mystery thriller
Starring Edward Hong, Yuuki Luna and Daniel C Kennedy

Hundreds of cash-strapped players accept a strange invitation to compete in children's games. Inside, a tempting prize awaits with deadly high stakes...

A few schools have urged parents to stop their kids watching Netflix's Squid Game. The Netflix show has been a huge hit but schools are reportedly concerned about copycat actions. Youngsters are believed to be wanting to re-enact the games in school playgrounds.

According to the Mirror, one dad said his children's school in Ilford, east London, warned parents in a letter about kids playing their own version of Squid Game and that parents could be sanctioned over it.

One school in Belgium also raised concerns over kids mimicking the show's outcome - with children beating up eliminated players.

Sandown School in Deal, Kent, issued extra lessons on violence and online harm as a response to the show's popularity. According to the Mirror, a spokeswoman for the school said Key Stage 2 teachers gave their pupils extra lessons on online safety and the dangers of watching content that is not age appropriate.

Goodwin Academy, another school in Deal, reportedly confirmed its safeguarding team sent a letter to parents regarding age concerns over the content in the series.

Squid Game has been rated appropriate for viewers aged 15 and older and Netflix gives a series of content warnings including sex, violence and suicide.

 

Update: Bedfordshire Council recommends Squid Games

18th October 2021. See article from theguardian.com

Central Bedfordshire Council  has advised parents not to let their children watch the Netflix show Squid Game, after reports children as young as six are copying its violent challenges.

The education safeguarding team from Central Bedfordshire council sent an email to parents and guardians in the district urging them to be vigilant after hearing reports that children and young people are copying games and violence from hit new Netflix series Squid Game, which is rated 15. The team wrote:

There have been some concerning reports recently about children and young people 'playing' Squid Game whilst at school. Squid Game is also being viewed via other platforms such as YouTube and TikTok, and given the popularity of the games in the show, developers have made various mini-games based on Squid Game on Roblox and other gaming platforms.

We strongly advise that children should not watch Squid Game. The show is quite graphic with a lot of violent content.

Update: Viewers heed the recommendations

18th October 2021. See article from inews.co.uk

Netflix has said that the violent Korean drama Squid Game is now its most successful TV show of all time.

The streaming giant told shareholders on Wednesday that the drama has been watched by a mind-boggling 142 million households around the world, though Netflix's definition of viewers includes people who only watched a small portion of a single episode of a TV show.

Microsoft has decided to pull social networking facilities from the Chinese version of LinkedIn business networking app. LinkedIn explains in a blog post:

Our decision to launch a localized version of LinkedIn in China in February 2014 was driven by our mission to connect the world's professionals to make them more productive and successful. We recognized that operating a localized version of LinkedIn in China would mean adherence to requirements of the Chinese government on Internet platforms. While we strongly support freedom of expression, we took this approach in order to create value for our members in China and around the world. We also established a clear set of guidelines to follow should we ever need to re-evaluate our localized version of LinkedIn in China.

This strategy has enabled us to navigate the operation of our localized version of LinkedIn in China over the past seven years to help our members in China find a job, share and stay informed. While we've found success in helping Chinese members find jobs and economic opportunity, we have not found that same level of success in the more social aspects of sharing and staying informed. We're also facing a significantly more challenging operating environment and greater compliance requirements in China. Given this, we've made the decision to sunset the current localized version of LinkedIn, which is how people in China access LinkedIn's global social media platform, later this year.

Our new strategy for China is to put our focus on helping China-based professionals find jobs in China and Chinese companies find quality candidates. Later this year, we will launch InJobs, a new, standalone jobs application for China. InJobs will not include a social feed or the ability to share posts or articles. We will also continue to work with Chinese businesses to help them create economic opportunity.

This decision aligns with our commitment to creating economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce. While that has been our vision for nearly two decades now, it feels more important than ever as we all strive to build a global economy that delivers more prosperity and progress to people all over the world.

Beijing has published a draft law stating that privately funded organisations shall not engage in news-gathering, editing, and broadcasting. Officials have not confirmed whether the new rules will apply to foreign news organisations operating in China, effectively making them illegal.

The proposed new rules ban private media-related businesses as part of a prohibited list of industries. The 2021 list is a very broad ban on everything relating to the news media sector. The equivalent list from the previous year allowed private news companies subject to a size cap.

Beijing has always held a tight grip over news and information in China, and virtually all media organisations are state-run, falling directly under government purview.

The draft law is currently open for public consultation for a week.

A Video on Demand ad for Salesforce, seen on All4 on 4 May 2021, began with a voiceover, stating, And now, a mini meditation. It then featured a woman working from home, trying to focus on her job despite her noisy home environment. The voiceover continued, Inhale serenity, exhale whatever's happening here. Now bring your focus back to your customer, Tom. The woman was then shown starting to levitate off her chair, in the lotus position, saying the name Tom in an extended fashion, with a long Om sound. The still-levitating woman then drifted out of the house, to a peaceful woodland setting, to carry on communicating with her customer online.

Three complainants, who believed that the ad mimicked a spiritual practice, in particular through the use of the elongated Om sound within the name Tom, challenged whether it was likely to cause serious or widespread offence.

Salesforce told us the ad was intended to be a humorous, non-religious portrayal of yoga and meditation, and was not intended to depict any specific religious group. They said they did not believe the ad would cause serious or widespread offence to viewers in general, or viewers of a particular faith.

In relation to the use of the elongated Om sound, Salesforce said that their research and understanding of the word indicated that it had been widely adopted as the unofficial symbol of yoga, and was increasingly associated with yoga, meditation and the wellbeing movement. They told us that they believed the use of the Om sound to be a common practice in non-religious yoga lessons. Salesforce said that they do not view the use of Om in their ad as depicting a sacred symbol or tenet of any faith, but rather as an aid to meditation, which they considered to be part of everyday usage of the word.

ASA Assessment: Complaints not upheld

The ASA noted that the ad was set in the context of a busy home-working environment, and considered viewers would understand that the character was attempting to relieve her stress and combat distraction by using techniques widely associated with yoga and meditation.

We acknowledged the complainants' concerns that some people might have objected to the depiction of meditation and the use of the Om sound in the context of the ad. However, we considered that viewers would be likely to interpret the ad as being a humorous representation of meditation practices which were widely associated with non-religious wellness or mindfulness techniques, used to help combat stress and maintain focus, and as a way of dealing with the pressures of working from home.

In that context, we considered that viewers were unlikely to find the use of the elongated Om sound in the name Tom to mimic or mock a specific spiritual practice, and we considered that the ad was unlikely to be seen as being derogatory to any specific religion. We therefore concluded that the ad was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence, and did not breach the Code.

A French court on Friday, has rejected a claim brought by two children's campaigns calling for the blocking of major porn websites in France.

The judge rejected the claim because the court facing time pressures had not been able to hear arguments from the sites' publishers.

The anti-porn campaigners had hoped for the blocking of nine top porn sites, including PornHub and Xvideos.

One of the ISPs being asked to censor the porn, Orange, noted that it already offered tools such as parental controls to limit children's access to online pornography.

Samuel Comblez of e-Enfance, one of the children's campaigners, said: It's not a completely lost battle, adding that it was now examining other ways to restrict access to the sites.

The UK Ministry of defence has published a wide ranging paper about better ways for it to catalogue and analyse data from multiple sources, mostly for military purposes.

The document contains a brief section speaking of a capability to monitor social media with a view to analysing changes in political sentiment:

The below present example scenarios for Defence to drive battlespace advantage and business efficiency through exploiting its data in a multi-domain and integrated environment.

Political demonstration:

• Sensors: Automated scanning of social media platforms (analysing key words and interactions) detects change in population sentiment.

• Decision makers: Local authorities are quickly informed of change in sentiment. Decision making is enhanced by local surveillance of groups of interest.

• Effectors: Escalated monitoring and intelligence gathering, with heightened readiness measures to respond in place.

Surely an incredibly short paragraph to describe such an enormous capability for state snooping.

New Iranian censorship rules have banned TV makers from showing women eating pizza on screen. Also, drama makers have been warned that men should not be shown serving women tea in scenes involving a workplace, while women must not wear leather gloves. Also women cannot be seen to be drinking red coloured liquids or eating sandwiches.

According to IranWire, government officials have issued the new guidelines to broadcasters and film makers following a recent audit.

To ensure that the strict new rules are followed, any scenes or photographs showing men and women in a domestic setting will have to be cleared by the IRIB before broadcast.

No doubt that there is some domestic logic linking the seemingly bizarre set of prohibitions but news sources haven't offered any explanation to date.

Viewers and listeners have told Ofcom they are generally more relaxed about most swearing on TV and radio, particularly if it is accidental and an apology swiftly follows, according to our latest in-depth research study.

Audiences say they still want broadcasters to consider carefully when, and how, offensive language is used. But many people recognise that, in the right context, it can play an important role in programmes.

Participants in the study felt that, in line with freedom of expression, offensive words can be used to create dramatic impact, bring humour, reflect real life, or even to inform and educate. In 2020, only 1% of total broadcasting complaints were about swearing. 8% of complaints were about racial discrimination.

They had limited concerns so long as the strongest language was broadcast after the watershed and parents were given sufficient warnings and information to help them decide what their children see and hear.

Timely, genuine apologies were also important to viewers and listeners in cases where offensive language was accidentally broadcast live on-air. Discriminatory language and stereotypes

By comparison, audiences told us they had more serious concerns about discriminatory language on TV and radio -- particularly around race.

In our focus groups, viewers and listeners pointed to the underlying attitudes that discriminatory language reflects, and had higher expectations about this being avoided, including during live broadcasts. Audiences said that, when strong forms of discriminatory language do appear in programmes, they expect broadcasters to do all they can to carefully put it into context and so protect viewers and listeners from the offence it can cause.

Opinions on older programmes containing potentially problematic content and language were mixed. Many participants said that they did not want to see these types of programmes disappear from screens completely -- arguing that history should not be censored or sanitised and that audiences would be aware they were from a different era.

Other participants suggested that older programmes containing outdated views could cause unnecessary offence and reinforce stereotypes. Most participants agreed, however, that clear and specific warnings about the type of language and content that might cause offence were important in helping audiences make an informed choice.

Adam Baxter, Director of Standards and Audience Protection said:

People's views on offensive language can change significantly over time. So to ensure we're setting and enforcing our rules effectively, it's essential we keep up to date with how viewers and listeners think and feel.

Broadcasters' and audiences' right to freedom of expression is important. These findings will help us to strike the right balance between protecting audiences -- and children in particular -- from unjustified offence, while still allowing broadcasters the creative freedom to reflect real life in their programmes.

This year, we've engaged with a larger and more diverse selection of viewers and listeners than ever before. This included more than 600 people of all ages and backgrounds, living throughout the UK, as well as those from a range of minority groups and communities. We also expanded our focus groups to include dedicated sessions with members of the Jewish and Chinese communities for the first time.

There is no absolute right not to be offended by things broadcast on TV and radio. Consistent with rights to freedom of expression, broadcasters can include material in their programmes that is potentially offensive -- but, to stay within our rules, they must make sure they provide sufficient context and adequate protection to audiences.

These findings will help broadcasters to better understand audience expectations about the use of potentially offensive language in their programmes, and what steps they may need to take to protect viewers and listeners.

Brass Eye is a 1997 UK TV comedy
Starring Christopher Morris, Mark Heap and Kevin Eldon

Controversial spoof documentaries of current affairs television, and the role of celebrity in the UK.

I just spotted a cut scene on YouTube from the satirical comedy series Brass Eye. The scene was cut from the last episode of the first series broadcast in March 1997. The theme of the episode was the moral decline Britain. A sequence about Peter Sutcliffe! The Musical was dropped by the TV company, Channel 4.

Christopher Morris was not pleased and inserted a subliminal message about the channel boss Michael Grade. The inserted card read simply: Grade is a cunt.

Rocky IV is a 1985 USA sport drama by Sylvester Stallone.
Starring Sylvester Stallone and Talia Shire and Burt Young.  

Rocky Balboa accompanies his friend Apollo Creed to the ring in a boxing match against a Russian Boxer named Ivan Drago. Drago is too strong for Creed, and unfortunately kills him in his match. Balboa blames himself for Creed's death and is determined to defeat Drago in a boxing match. He gains the help of Creed's former manager, Duke and travels to U.S.S.R. to take on Drago.

A Director's Cut for Rocky IV is being released in US cinemas on 11th November.

Director, writer and star Sylvester Stallone masterfully has reshape Rocky IV with 40 minutes of never-before-seen footage. He reports that the fight scenes are more intense, the music is more powerful and the drama is heightened.

The Ultimate Director's Cut will then be available to rent on demand beginning Friday, November 12.