Carrefour selling illegal DVD copies in Kuwait?
So I was shopping in Carrefour in Avenues with the family and I saw 300 the movie. I bought the original copy from there, like a good American … arr I mean Kuwaiti. Taking it home, opening it when there is no one else at home, excited to play it in the home theatre and see what it’s like after so much great review about the movie graphics and direction. I was surprised to see the bonus CD looking like this:
That looks like Indian or some other language. And to be honest, I’m not really going to be able to follow up with Indian 300 movie. Lucky it was only the cover and the movie it self is English. So I watched and enjoyed it. But I felt there is something missing. Like some scenes from the trailer were not there “Instead ask yourself what should a free man do?”. When I watched the bonus I saw parts of the missing scenes. So now even the original copies are censored in Kuwait, at least in Carrefour and Virgin as I heard before. I have to say, the censoring is the kind of clean one. Meaning you don’t see the movie jumping from one scene to the other. They try to remove scenes that are offensive in a way that won’t annoy the person watching it. Still however, I was able to feel missing scenes, and the fact that the cover does not mention that this is a censored version makes it worse. There should be a sign about it.
But that’s not the most surprising thing. What really caught my eyes is the end of movie warning you see below. There was a message at the bottom clearly saying:
“FOR SALE OR RENTAL FOR HOME USE IN INDIA, BANGLADESH, AND SRI LANKA ONLY.”
Doesn’t need to consult your lawyer to tell this is an illegal distribution of the copy! I read this and say to my self “Why did I want to be the good American?” I could get the CD for less, uncensored and I chose when to skip, and they are both illegal at the end of the day. I also remembered when I bought a DVD from Virgin that was for US region only. So that was a lesson for me. I have bought my last DVD from Kuwait. From now on, it’s all from outside.
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May be they sue their main office if it was located in Dubai or another part of the world where intellectual property rights and copy rights are respected. But in Kuwait I don’t think that they will sue over something this small ..
Hi, these are not indian languages .. these are european languages, greek, russian, spanish, dutch etc, and as far as I can tell it says :NOT FOR RENT. there is nothing about illegal about this dvd.. so rest assured :)
guest: Maybe the language is not indian, I was not sure so thanks for telling me. The DVD it self is original. The distribution however in middle-east is not for sure!
Just would like to turn your attention to the fact that this DVD is didtributed in kuwait by Vanilla and the same copies are available in the whole market in kuwait by the same distributor.
Plus Mr.free man note that these are the traditions ( I mean the censored parts)of our country so either live with it or not.
PS:Please note that the censered scene was A SEX SCENE.This is our country and we are happy for that so keep your comments for yourself…
Fahed: Thanks very much for your polite comments. It’s my blog where I could write what I want without any offense to others. Those who don’t like it can visit any other site. And many people share my opinion here.
First, I did not state these copies are only from Carrefour, I stated I found it in carrefour. If its somewhere else then it’s also illegal distribution and you should be a shame defending this. It’s illegal, and if you care about religion, then it’s a sin to sell illegal distribution Mr. religious. It seems to me by the way you defend it that you have something to do with this business. Otherwise, it’s not logic to assume something legal because it’s sold every where. We all know pirated copies are sold online and down the street infront of police eyes for 1 KD. But you can’t say it’s legal can you? Also, how do you feel about buying DVD with cover written in language you can’t understand? Typical idiot.
About the censored scenes, not all DVDs are censored, and not all censored scenes are sex ones. I’m not sure you have read my post properly or you understand English properly. I am not against censoring SEX scenes but against the missing scenes that goes with it, and against intensive censoring. I am also with having everything legal and properly mentioned. If there is missing part it should be stated. If it’s widescreen, if it’s HD Format if its tied to region if it has translation. Everything should be on the cover. I also wonder how do you know it was all SEX scenes if you didn’t watch the whole uncensored movie. Seems you enjoy watching it but want to show your self as Mr.religious. Either that or do not talk about things you did not see.
If you don’t believe what I say about censoring non-sex scenes, read what other people say. 30 minutes censored from Lord of the Rings movie for 1 kiss! Read this other post of mine to understand clearly what I mean.It’s either stupid censoring, or the movie does not fit our environment. So why show it? They just want the money.
Aren’t Kuwait so selective when it comes to Copyright and distribution regulations? Its either they accept the fact they can’t control it or just put a real stop to it, the half-a**ed solution never works and make people lose all respect!
Well So many comments, the one thing for sure,, you cannot do anything, and besides, people loves to buy it,, even thought they know it at first..
The last thing is , you can cannot touch carrefour for this small issue.
daredevil: What exactly are you referring to here as small? Selling illegal distribution copies, or not making it clear this is a censored version. In a country where order is preserved, non of these are small issues. One is breaking the law with items you are selling, and another is fooling your customer.
I personally like Carrefour, I don’t pretend to boycot it. But Letting go this mentality is not something I am welling to do. If it’s censored, tell ahead it’s censored, and what’s the playtime after censorship.
the cover is in greek and othe european languages, but only european…i am greek so i can translate for u that it says its forbidden for kids under 13 and this copy is only for sale… but the screen message u saw says about india bagladesh n sri lanka, which is not greek… obviously.. the greek copies say greece…as someone would expect.. so ur copy is a bit messed up if u ask me
I think they figured out a way to illegally sell legal DVDs, or legally sell illegal DVDs ..
either way there’s something illegal and it might be a matter of time before they get sued by the MPAA ( Motion Picture Association of America )