Sharon Stone Banned from Chinese Cinemas

Sharon Stone's suggestion that China's annihilative earthquake on May 12 may possibly have been due to bad "karma" may not have been the best publicity for her new films at the Shanghai International Film Festival.

Last Thursday at the Festival de Cannes, according to hollywoodreporter.com, Stone made the comment: "I'm not happy about the way the Chinese are treating the Tibetans because I don't think anyone should be unkind to anyone else," Stone said in a brief red-carpet interview with Cable Entertainment News of Hong Kong. "And then this earthquake and all this stuff happened, and then I thought, is that karma? When you're not nice that the bad things happen to you?"

Stone is reportedly upset with the treatment of ethnic Tibetans in China as well as the exile of their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, whom she considered a close friend.

China's recent earthquake took the lives of more than 65,000 people so far, and is a very sensitive subject. Many Chinese feel Stone crossed the line with her implications and have decided to boycott her films in their country. A few large cinema-chain owners have already vowed to ban her movies from playing in their theaters.

Stone, after receiving notice of the natural disaster as well as being asked to help the situation stated, "Sometimes you have to learn to put your head down and be of service, even to people who aren't nice to you. That's a big lesson for me," according to hollywoodreporter.com.