Screens at Metro stations did not show award-winning film because it had an erotic nature, not because of homosexual content, said transport company

The Metro company in Copenhagen has been accused of homophobia after it refused to air a winning short film on the stations’ flat screens, because it contained images of two men kissing.

Mette Carla T. Albrechtsen’s film ‘XY Anatomy of a Boy’ won the audience prize at the 60seconds short film festival, which was designed to create films to air on Metro screens.

The film shows six homosexual young men telling their stories in various locations. One of the images shows two men kissing in a shower.

More than 800 people have joined a protest group on social networking website Facebook expressing their outrage at the Metro company’s decision, while the company’s offices have received dozens of complaint letters.

Kåre Møller Madsen, spokesman for the Metro company, denied any allegations of homophobia, saying the film was not shown as it went against company policy. It was felt that the film had an erotic nature and it would have been similarly banned if a man and woman had been kissing in the shower scene.

Peer Dahlin Røpke Aagaard was one of the complainants who felt the transport company’s excuse was not good enough.

‘There was nothing pornographic about it. This is artistic censorship and homophobic,’ Aagaard said to Politken newspaper, alleging that sexualised images of women’s breasts have been shown on the Metro screens in the past.

Madsen could not rule out that this was the case, but said that the XY film had been judged to be of a sexual nature and violated Metro policy.

Of the 26 festival films that were shown on the screens, the jury’s choice of overall winner - Torben Klærgaard’s ‘Untitled’ - was also ruled out as inappropriate for viewing at the Metro stations due to its images of five dancing naked men.