THE EUROPEAN Court of Human Rights yesterday upheld a British ban on an erotic film about the visions of a 16th century Spanish nun, rejecting charges that it violated the director's freedom of expression.
The judges ruled by seven to two that Britain's 1989 ban on the 18 minute Visions of Ecstasy, about the Roman Catholic mystic Saint Teresa of Avila, did not breach the European Convention on Human Rights. The court agreed such censorship was justified under blasphemy laws to avoid shocking Christians.
The film's director, Nigel Wingrove, said: "Britain now has the heaviest film censorship anywhere in the west . . . I think religion is big enough to withstand people like me."
The judges reached the decision after more than a year's deliberations, including viewing the film that includes sex scenes between the heroine and an actor representing Jesus Christ.
The ruling was a rare victory for Britain, which is often at odds with the court, a branch of the 40 nation Council of Europe.
Downing Street has accused the court of riding roughshod over domestic law on a number of occasions, including its verdict that the killing of three IRA members by the SAS in Gibraltar was a breach of the paramilitaries' human rights.
The European Commission of Human Rights, which vets cases for the court, angered London in September by agreeing to take up the case of a British 12 year old boy challenging British laws that allow his parents to smack him. And this year it condemned Britain's system for jailing minors.
Yesterday's ruling differed from the Commission, whose experts voted by 14 to two in a non binding opinion in 1995 that the ban on Visions of Ecstasy violated freedom of expression. Most court rulings match those by the Commission.
Britain's Lord Chancellor, Lord Mackay, was in Strasbourg yesterday to urge the court to take more account of national traditions and cultures when assessing human rights cases.