There's a sequence in Nagesh Kukunoor's Lakshmi where Shefali Shah, stunningly effective as a brothel's Madame, cuts off the resident's pimp's penis.
The sequence showed the blood-splattered hand of Shefali holding the pimp's still-erect penis.The despicable pimp is played by the film's director Nagesh Kukunoor .
Very shocking, very explicit by Indian film's standards.
The shot has been removed by the censorboard.
Says the film's co-producer Elahe Hiptoolah, `We still have the sequence suggesting Shefali Shah's character castrating the bloody pimp. But we've removed the closeup shot of the penis in Shefali's hand. We wanted to show the dis-empowerment of the brutal man in a literal way. But Censor Board found the shot unaesthetic. Finally we decided to remove the penis shot.`
If the shot had remained Kukunoor would have been the first actor in cinema anywhere to show his private part removed from his body.
`Prosthetics. I am intact everyhere,` the director quips.
