This Film Is Not Yet Rated (2006)

This film is an eye opener. I feel everyone passionate about film needs to watch this. I agree that some films get unfair ratings, and the appeal process goes in the MPAA's favor. There are films that have way better messages than other movies, and the films with a great message are what should be watched by people. I'm not saying raunchy comedies shouldn't be watched by people, I do laugh at those movies, but I know movies that don't get a wide release that deserve it. I really liked the interviews with directors who had their film edited not what they wanted. I think that movies with nudity deserve a R rating depending on what is shown, but if you give a movie with a sex scene with two characters that love each other an NC-17 and movie characters having sex with prostitutes an R, then what is wrong you. I think this documentary is great which is why it gets a 10/10. If you get a chance to see it, watch it.

It's always interesting to see a documentary about movies especially important ones but This Film Is Not Yet Rated isn't as dangerous as it's trying to make itself seem. Although it does have some serious moral implications as Kirby hires a private investigator to find out who are the anonymous members of the MPAA. The investigation is attempted to be presented in a cinematic way with reaction shots and closeups and all the coverage a film should have to be edited together, but its attempt feels contrived and unconvincing due to it being shot on DV. It attempts to be entertainment with caper music and graphics but this just takes away the sincerity. There were times when I struggled to agree with either side of the filmmaker vs. ratings arguments as all it seemed to be was merely a power struggle. However, when it got into the specificity of the details it had some interesting points, such as the implications of sex vs. violence and how sex is accused of hurting society more than violence, particularly homosexual sex. As well as how with guns shooting people with no blood is considered more acceptable than shooting people with blood and how the position of the camera for sex scenes that implicates thrusting is more acceptable than when it shows the trusting. It had a great payoff in the end as its conspiracy is revealed and the intentions behind the documentary are justified but the packaging does hold it back.7/10

I watched this movie in a film class, and found it to be juvenile and biased. "Outing" the reviewers who work for the MPAA, filming one of them surreptitiously while she was eating a sandwich, and going through one of the reviewer's garbage was an appalling invasion of privacy. The movie attempted, with some success, to label this issue as one of free speech, censorship, religious nuts trying to tell me what I can see, secrecy and studio power. This attempted label is nonsense. The true issue is how do we protect our children from the purveyors of smut who would show our children anything in order to make a buck. The movie seems to say that the current rating system does a lousy job of protecting our children from scenes of violence, so the solution is to allow them to see explicit images of all types of depraved sexual activity. Adults should, and do, watch anything they wish to. The rating system has nothing to do with an adult's freedom to see what he or she wishes. Nor does the current system tell anyone what kind of movies to make. Those who own movie theaters are well within their rights if they elect not to show movies containing graphic details of sexual activity, just as parents are free not to allow their children to go to multi- plexes showing films with graphic sexual content - as many would. If anything, our current rating system is far too lax in not sufficiently warning parents about movies containing profanity, sexual acts, degrading acts against women, and acts of violence. In closing, this self-indulgent and self-serving film offered no adult discussion of the harm or lack thereof on children from their observing explicit images of sexual acts or violence or any reasonable alternatives to our current voluntary system of rating films.

In the movie "Dragonfly", Kevin Costner's character says the "F" word once. At that point in the director's commentary, Tom Shadyac says, "...You can shoot a guy 3,000 times and get a 'PG-13', but if you say the 'F' word *twice* it's automatically an 'R'. I'll let that be its own comment." This was when I first started really thinking about the movie rating system as such, though the subject of our society's (by which I mean primarily America) bizarre, obsessive, unhealthy attitude toward nudity and sex is something which I have thought about for a long time. We are obsessed with nudity and sex -- as the old saying goes, "Sex sells," (which is understood to mean nudity, which of course is *not* the same as sex) -- and at the same time, apparently utterly terrified of it. This split has led us, as a society, to a point of hysterical insanity on the subject, and given us the highest incidence of teen pregnancy in the world, and by FAR the highest incidence of rape -- close to 10 times higher than the next-highest country.This film offers a greatly detailed perspective on one major manifestation of the issue, the movie censorship system -- sorry, I mean "rating" system. The side-by-side comparison of R and NC-17 scenes was particularly revealing. It just boggles my mind that people get so twisted up on this subject.I love the irony that the very ratings board scrutinized in this film was required to watch it. If there are any honest members on that board, perhaps it got them to think a little more about what they do and how they operate.(P.S. the explanation of the ratings near the beginning is hilarious!)