We live in a world which is heading toward moral decay. It used to be very peaceful and civilized. We knew no war (the story of Holy War was a well-planned hoax to be used later as an excuse Kingdom of Heaven), no barbarian, no murder between brothers (Abel and Cain were actually puppy dogs). Now we have prostitutes, women wearing short skirts, hoodlums, and riots. Blame movies for the declining values of human kind. The invention of movies is our biggest sin.

Thank God we live in Indonesia where the last noble, intelligent people gather in an institution called the Board of Censorship (LSF). They make sure we won't see people making love on screen, and protect us from the ugliness of western culture. Read about the board here. You can also read their brilliant guidelines in censoring film there which include one point which prohibit filmmakers from portraying bad things about government officials. They are our leaders. They must be saints. Many rooms in heaven have been for them.

I remember watching this film called The Last Seduction with Linda Fiorentino some years ago in the cinema. The film tells the story of a corrupt woman named Bridget who manipulates people to get what she wants. In the end, she gets away with everything. The board makes sure we don't get the wrong lesson so they put subtitles before the closing credits which says: "In the end, Bridget is arrested by the authority and punished for her crimes."

I just heard the news that they didn't pass Rudy Soedjarwo's horror flick called Pocong because it contains the story about May 1998's riot, among other things including violence. They told the producer that we shouldn't remember bad things like that. The board members are the most thoughtful people.

I remember having an argument with the board's chair woman, Mrs. Titi Said who is also a novelist, when they cut half a second of my movie Janji Joni (Joni's Promise) for showing two people making out in the cinema. The sweet lady told me that it was for own sake. She said that if they didn't cut it, some "militant" groups would take action on their own and attack the cinema which would play the movie. You see, they just want to protect us filmmakers. We have no law which forbids people from destroying other people's property. So they are there to keep it from happening. Mrs. Titi Said also motherly said that she was just being a mother to us filmmakers. I was shouting and banging my head on the wall because, like talking to my own mother, we were like doing a two-way monologue.

In the end, we just sipped our tea peacefully. Just like after everytime I had a fight with my own mother. Then she said she had a wonderful story idea from her novel which should be a perfect material to be considered for a movie. The story was about a woman who, after getting gang-raped by several men, goes out for revenge. I told her we could do it twice as extreme as in I Spit on Your Grave. She just nodded. Of course she never saw that movie.

This journal is getting absurd. I'm having a headache. Excuse me, I have to end this and watch the special edition of I Spit on Your Grave again.