Controversial ''sex and wrecks'' movie Crash was passed for release uncut by the British Board of Film Classification last night.

Board director James Ferman said the ''unusual and disturbing film'' was neither illegal nor harmful.

The BBFC showed the film - which depicts characters sexually aroused by car crashes - to a top lawyer, forensic psychologist, and audience of disabled people before granting it an 18 certificate.

David Cronenberg's film was described as ''beyond the bounds of depravity'' in one newspaper. It was greeted with a storm of critical revulsion and criticism, and London's Westminster Council provisionally banned it.

However, film-makers rallied to its defence in the name of artistic freedom.

A spokeswoman for distributors Columbia Tristar said: ''The film has already opened all over the world without any cuts and we are pleased that British audiences will also be able to see it.''

She said that it would be some time before a release date was fixed with cinemas.

Unusually, the BBFC published its long and detailed finding, in which it said Cronenberg treated his theme ''with clinical detachment.''

It said: ''The car crashes are stripped of exciting spectacle.

''The mood is often slow and dreamlike, and the audience is not encouraged to share the feelings of the characters.''

The QC consulted by the BBFC found that ''rather than sympathising or identifying with the attitudes or tastes of the characters in this film, the average viewer would in the end be repelled by them, and would reject the values and sexual proclivities displayed.''

Heritage Secretary Virginia Bottomley, who said at the height of the furore that she would like to see local authorities use their powers against unacceptable films, said: ''It is a matter for the official censors. My responsibility is broadcasting.''