Meighan Byron: This film is not yet rated
“Filmmakers can now predict with a fair amount of certainty what their films’ ratings will be. In addition, it is a fairly simple matter to edit a film to conform to a particular rating’s requirements.�
Those interviewed in This Film Is Not Yet Rated, or Kirby Dick would not agree with this statement. If we learned anything from Kirby and the other interviewees is that there is no consistency on what films will be rated. Sex is definitely more subversive in the eyes of the MPAA. The commentators in the film we watched were dumbfounded that sex is treated worse than violence by the MPAA and that their ratings are incredibly inconsistent and absurd. For example, how you can say the word fuck as an expletive but not as a reference to having sex. Maria Bello pointed out that pubic hair is deemed worse by the MPAA than a scene in one of the Scary Movie horror comedies when Carmen Electra has her breasts removed by being cut open with a knife. An act that was horribly violent and did receive an R rating. The pubic hair scene in The Cooler with Maria Bello received an NC-17 rating because of her pubic hair showing during a love scene. What we witnessed in the film this week were several examples of how violence in movies is treated less harshly than sex scenes are. Also sex is treated differently according to gender and sexual orientation. Jason Biggs fucking a pie receives an R rating and Natasha Leone in But I’m a Cheerleader, gets slapped initially with an NC-17 rating because she is a woman masturbating. They also provided an example of a guy masturbating the in the shower in American Beauty, and how that was given an R rating as well, not NC 17. Violence against women is horribly prevalent as well. I never realized that before but it is. Stories that degrade women and show extreme domestic violence is so very common place. Those are the movies that should be given an NC 17 rating.