Iran to boycott 2013 Oscars over anti-Islamic film

Ugh. In case you need a reminder what a government tangled up with religious fundamentalists would be like.

(Jakarta Globe) Iran said on Monday it would boycott the 2013 Oscars to protest against the making of a crude anti-Islam video in the United States that has caused outrage throughout the Muslim world.

Despite tough censorship and the repression of leading film makers, Iranian art cinema has earned international acclaim over the past 20 years.

Asghar Farhadi’s “A Separation” won the Oscar for best foreign language film in February, the first Iranian film to do so.

Culture and Islamic Guidance Minister Mohammad Hosseini said Iran would boycott the next Academy Awards “to protest against the making of a film insulting the Prophet and because of the organizers’ failure to take an official position (against the film),” the Iranian Students’ News Agency reported.

He also urged other Islamic countries to boycott the Oscars.

Who’s being punished? What filmmakers pay the price for the sustained idiocy? Iran’s submission for Best Foreign Language Film was to have been Reza Mirkarimi’s dramatic comedy “A Cube of Sugar.”