This is the last film censor’s certificate that James Montgomery ever signed

Appointed in 1923, this self-styled ‘moral sieve’ cut any scenes with kissing, blasphemy, incest, divorce, contraception, abortion, homosexuality, adultery or illegitimacy. He didn’t like the word virgin, or any mention of prostitutes – ‘with or without a heart of gold.’

Two and a half thousand films have been banned in the history of this state. Of those, James Montgomery personally banned over 1,800. He once said of a film under review: “The girl dancing on the village green shows more leg than I’ve seen on any village green in Ireland. Better amputate them.”

Watch a clip from ‘Rocky Road to Dublin’ which deals with censorship in Ireland: