Yahoo News Here's why Putin was cut from J-Law's spy movie
Jennifer Lawrence's new spy movie Red Sparrow might be set in Russia, but don't expect any references to Vladimir Putin.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Fox has chosen to keep Putin out of the movie even though he plays a key role in the book by former CIA officer Jason Matthews, on which the movie is based.
Initially, that was because the original idea was to shift the story from modern-day Russia to 1970s Budapest, but even when the story was moved back to the modern day, Putin is not said to have been restored.
It's claimed that Fox avoided references to Putin to avoid any chance of falling foul of hackers, such as when Sony was targeted because of The Interview.
Putin will also not be referenced in the film Kursk, based on the true story of a Russian submarine that sank to the bottom of the Barents Sea in 2000, despite the fact he appears in the source novel and was in early versions of the script.
"For a studio to release a movie about Putin that makes him look like a fool would be suicide. That's a certain way to be targeted [for retaliation]," suggested Ajay Arora, CEO of security firm Vera, which works with studios.
Red Sparrow follows a Russian spy (Lawrence) who is wooed by the CIA to become a double agent.
Earlier this year, Lawrence spoke out about a leaked video of her pole dancing at a strip club, said to have been filmed while she was shooting Red Sparrow in Austria.
She said of the footage: "I'm not going to apologise, I had a BLAST that night."
Red Sparrow is released on cinemas on March 2.
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