Max Fisher writes a column in The Atlantic on the technology used to censor films in Iran:

Censoring foreign movies used to mean simply pulling out the scissors, cutting away inappropriate scenes and shots until the film was a good deal shorter and made a lot less sense. But, in 2010, Iranian authorities acquired new technology allowing them to manipulate images and dialogues into Islamic inappropriateness. 

 

“Romantic dialogue is often changed. For example, it isn’t proper for a woman to say to her partner, ‘I love you,'” Iranian journalist Reza Valizadeh explained to Radio Free Europe’s Golnaz Esfandiari in a 2010 interview. “It’s clear how dialogue about sexual proposals is dealt with — they are changed to marriage proposals. Also we see that beer becomes lemonade on state television and whiskey becomes orange juice. Also dialogue about politics is often changed.”

 

Censors will sometimes edit immodest images — whether it’s a man and woman sitting too closely, someone drinking a cocktail, or even an open neckline — by cutting the offending person or object or by simply placing some visual obstacle. The Iranian film fan site CaffeCinema.com put together a series of side-by-side comparisons showing the before-and-after of this new censorship technique.