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It was a cloak-and-dagger moment in Indonesia’s culture war between peddlers of titillation and Islamist conservatives.

In a run-down maternity hospital in Jakarta’s gritty exurbs recently, the shooting of “Evil Nurse 2,” a sequel to a low-budget horror film, proceeded under unusually tight secrecy.

Rather than seek news coverage for the movie, the filmmaker, Ody Mulya Hidayat, swore entertainment reporters to silence. An ill-timed piece of publicity could bring enraged Islamist activists banging down the door. A single leaked photo could invite prosecution and a lengthy jail term.

The reason for all the furtiveness was Sora Aoi, a diminutive Japanese sex-film star who had been spirited into the country for a leading role in the movie. Her presence was concealed as she was ferried between her hotel and shoots around Jakarta.

Aoi, and others like her, are the secret of a winning formula stumbled upon by Maxima Pictures, the production house where Hidayat is an executive producer. For two years, Maxima has made some of Indonesia’s most popular domestic films based on a simple premise: that many in Muslim-majority Indonesia will pay to see foreign porn stars perform — clothed — in local films. Just don’t expect Indonesians to own up to it.

“We’re hypocrites,” said Hidayat, who is a Muslim. “People know who they are, but they won’t admit it. It’s a love-hate thing.”

In few countries is the word “pornography” as politically charged as in Indonesia. Long known for its moderate and syncretic practice of Islam, and home to a large non-Muslim population, Indonesia has in recent years experienced a surge of orthodox Islam that has tried to reshape society, with the war on smut as a cause celebre.

In 2008, Parliament passed a law including jail sentences of up to 12 years for producing or distributing pornography, which is defined broadly as anything — a drawing, a movie or a body movement — deemed to violate “public decency.” An online pornography filter was imposed by the government last year. At the same time, Islamist vigilante groups like the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) have taken to the streets to enforce morality, sometimes violently, as the police have stood by.

The groups are bolstered by provisions in the anti-pornography law that empower private citizens to act. While ostensibly about morality, the campaign is seen by many liberals and minorities as a broader push to Islamize Indonesia.

The filmmakers at Maxima are unlikely cultural warriors. With a standard fare relying heavily on ghosts, gore and teen slapstick, their films are hardly high art, said Yoen K, one of the company’s producers.

“You have to realize that our market is the C, D, E class, not the A, B class for Indonesian movies,” he said.

But the company does know its market. In 2009, Maxima prompted a nationwide media sensation — as well as denunciations by politicians and protests by FPI hard-liners — by announcing its plan to work with Maria Ozawa, a Japanese sex-film star.

While protests forced Maxima to cancel plans to film scenes with Ozawa in Jakarta, the controversy showed that for many Indonesians, Miyabi — as Indonesians popularly know Ozawa — was already a household name. Films starring her (“Kidnapping Miyabi”) and another Japanese porn star, “Rin Sakuragi” (“Evil Nurse”), have been resounding successes.

But making the films means toeing a delicate legal line and avoiding provoking vigilantes, Hidayat said. “First we have to make sure the film is safe, passes the censor, and then it’s ready to show.”

He said he feared that a single clip or screen shot showing too much flesh, if made public before passing the censorship board, could be used as a basis for prosecution under the 2008 anti-pornography law.

As far as Islamist protesters are concerned, Hidayat said, “They want to scream about morals, go ahead. But our films go through the legal processes, through the film censors.”

The last time Maxima failed to keep its intentions under wraps, things did not go well. In late 2010, when the producers were discovered to be planning to fly Ozawa in to promote a second film that had been shot in secret, “Carriage Ghost,” the FPI struck, protesting at Maxima’s offices and sending members to Jakarta’s international airport with hopes of intercepting Ozawa and sending her back to Japan by force.

Hidayat’s attempt to defuse the situation with a meeting at Maxima’s offices was a failure.

On Dec. 1, trailed by television cameras and dressed in white turbans and crisp robes, the Jakarta leadership of the FPI swept into the office, past a group of hired muscle brought in by the studio for security.

Facing Hidayat across a conference table, Salim Alattas, the FPI’s Jakarta chief, denounced Ozawa as a poisonous influence on the nation’s morality. Hidayat had been warned twice to not bring her to Indonesia, Alattas said. There would be no third warning.

“We come with good intentions, but if you try to sneak Miyabi in, our intentions will no longer be good,” he said.

Another FPI leader, Sahab Anggawi, lost his composure: “For destroying this country, you should be thrown out! Or have both your hands cut off! Then have both your feet cut off!”
 
Hidayat, visibly sweating, didn’t commit to making any changes.
Other Maxima producers, including Yoen, a non-Muslim ethnic Chinese, stayed out of sight in another room. Shortly afterward, Maxima canceled Ozawa’s trip and later brought in Aoi.

Months later, Hidayat said he was confident enough about how far he could push Indonesia’s moral enforcers. After its secret filming, “Evil Nurse 2” is set for release in late April, and Maxima is looking to bring in more Japanese porn stars — without prior publicity.

“There’s give and take, there’s a limit to their attacks,” Hidayat said of the radical groups.

Aoi, the star of “Evil Nurse 2,” said the fact that Indonesia was a conservative country gave her pause, but that she decided to press on regardless of earlier controversies. Her goal here, she said during a break between shooting in early March, is the same as for the other nonpornography projects she has undertaken in Japan, Thailand, South Korea and China: to complement her notoriety in the sex-film business with mainstream fame.

“One of my career goals was to work abroad, and I also love to be in entertainment,” she said. “And I was also really looking forward to coming into contact with foreigners and engaging in communication.”

The New York Times