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From: reiher@onyx.jpl.nasa.gov (Peter Reiher)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.cinema
Subject: Re: NC-17 controversies
Message-ID: <1990Nov29.193335.3766@eddie.mit.edu>
Date: 29 Nov 90 19:33:35 GMT
References: <1990Nov27.205705.5453@eddie.mit.edu> <1990Nov29.062845.10281@eddie.mit.edu>
Sender: thakur@eddie.mit.edu (Manavendra K. Thakur)
Reply-To: reiher@onyx.jpl.nasa.gov (Peter Reiher)
Followup-To: rec.arts.cinema
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA
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Approved: thakur@zerkalo.harvard.edu


In article <1990Nov29.062845.10281@eddie.mit.edu> pauls@tellabs.com (Paul Silver) writes:
>
>A third possibility is that the MPAA could refuse to rate the porn
>film.  Just because a film is submitted for a rating does not mean
>that the MPAA is required to give it a rating.  It just returns the
>producer's fee and tells him they will not rate it.  He then is forced
>to give it an X rating, or try to release it unrated, which now
>amounts to the same thing.

Do you have any actual knowledge that the MPAA can or would do this?
Everything I have ever heard about them suggests that their supposed charter
is to rate any and every film submitted.  The fee is supposedly only to
cover their costs.  Unless I am much mistaken (always possible), refusing to
rate a film would signal a major shift in their policy, the sort of shift
they typically make over Jack Valenti's heavily pummelled body.

In essence, refusing to rate a film would be equivalent to admitting that
they were making quality judgements on the merits of a film.  Valenti has
always been adamant that the MPAA does not care about the quality of a film,
but merely examines its contents for possibly offensive material.  This
position is important for the MPAA, because they wish to avoid endless
fights over whether the inclusion of a naked woman's breast is "artistically
valid" or "mere titillation".  They already do some of this, but they've
never liked it and always try to avoid such value judgements.

So, yes, this is an option.  But it would be an important change in the
policy of the MPAA.  They would then have to think about what happens if "In
the Realm of the Senses" is resubmitted.  I suspect that no sex act shown in
"Blond Emmanuel" is likely to be missing from "In the Realm of the Senses",
with similar levels of explicitness.  Given some of what happens in "In the
Realm of the Senses", the producer of "Blond Emmanuel" can probably make an
argument that his film is *less* offensive.  So what does the MPAA do then?
They can reject "In the Realm of the Senses", despite it's clearly being a
serious artistic film, thereby holding the position that there is still an X
rating that is different from the NC-17 rating.  Or they can rate "In the
Realm of the Senses" NC-17, in which case they have admitted to making
judgements on artistic merit.

To address another post, why does the producer (or perhaps just the current
owner) of "Blond Emmanuel" want an NC-17 rating?  His stated reason is that
he believes it will give his film better shelf exposure at video stores.  He
claims video store owners will be more willing to put an NC-17 film out on
display than an X rated film.  More likely, what he's really after is a
little publicity, to set his sex film apart from all the other sex films out
there.  If he makes a big enough fuss, a sizable number of the people who
rent sexually explicit videos will probably check this one out, rather than,
say, "Debbie Does Dallas VI".  It's really a marketing ploy, I think, at the
potential expense of any serious filmmaker who wanted to make a film that
doesn't fit into the restraints placed on R-rated movies.  It's rather
likely that no other sex film of this sort will be submitted to the MPAA,
since the publicity value of the second one is much lower than that of the
first, but one may be enough to do the damage.

			Peter Reiher
			reiher@onyx.jpl.nasa.gov
			. . . cit-vax!elroy!jato!jade!reiher