Angelina Jolie has been given back a permit to film in Bosnia that was briefly withdrawn because of rumours that her movie featured a rape victim who falls in love with her assailant, her producer said on Monday.
Jolie was given back the permit for her first project as a director after the country's culture minister was given the script in an attempt to assure him the rumours were false, said Edin Sarkic, Jolie's Bosnian producer. The minister did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
Mass rape was a taboo topic in the immediate aftermath of the country's 1992-95 war between Serb and Bosnian Muslim forces but since then victims have formed a group to campaign for their rights, which has become one of the country's most powerful lobbies.
The Association of Women Victims of War protested Jolie's production after hearing rumours that the film's main characters — a Bosnian woman and a Serb man — were a rape victim and rapist.
Jolie said in a written statement Friday that it would be a shame if "unfair pressure based on wrong information" prevented her crew from shooting her film, whose title hasn't been publicly released.
"My hope is that people will hold judgment until they have seen the film," Jolie said.
