Tamil Film Active Producers Association recently filed a petition at Madras High Court seeking a ban on online film reviews for the initial three days after films' release. However, on Thursday, the court rejected the petition, stating that approving it would mean a breach of freedom of speech and expression.
Justice N Anand Venkatesh held that reviewers are entitled to share their opinions on films on both social networking websites and mainstream media, hence producers cannot expect positive feedback alone. According to the judge, the association has to accept it as a norm instead of trying to ban reviews altogether.
The judge also opined that reviews are common in today's day and age and it is not a fair practice to stop it, regardless of the type of product at issue. He reminded the producers about the hypothetical situation where a person from a different part of the world reviewing a film, even if the practice is impermissible here. He also highlighted the role of individual discretion when it comes to deciding whether to watch a film or not that goes beyond reviews.
Recent films such as Kamal Haasan and Mani Ratnam's Thug Life and Suriya and Karthik Subbaraj's Retro faced negative criticism online.
