Lahore, Pakistan, Sep 5, 2007 / 07:21 am
The writer and director of a controversial Pakistani film, currently screening at the Venice Film Festival, said he hopes his film will "reform the fundamentalists in Pakistan in particular, and the Muslim world in general."
Shoaib Mansoor’s film, In the Name of God, is a box office hit in Pakistan despite fatwas [scholarly edicts based on Islamic law] and legal threats from Muslim leaders, such as the radical cleric of Islamabad's Red Mosque, Abdul Rashid Ghazi. Ghazi was one of more than 50 people killed in the assault on the mosque in early July.
In another attempt to block the film, a petition was filed at the Lahore High Court in August, but the court eventually ruled against it.
The film is currently playing on 11 screens in 10 cities in Pakistan. It reportedly took $180,000 in its opening weekend last month and grossed $500,000 in its first three weeks.