Should commentaries be rated independant of the film itself? (1 Viewer)

[george kaplan]

As far as I know there's only one word that will get you an automatic R rating, and that's "fuck" (or a variation thereof).

 

[Damin J Toell]

Just one won't do it. A quick IMDb quote search turns up America's Sweethearts, for example.

DJ

 

[Matthew Chmiel]

Top three uses of the word "fuck" in a non sexual manner, you're getting the R. Top one use of the word "fuck" in a sexual manner, you're getting the R.

However to the latter, there are exceptions to the rule (Julia Roberts' line in My Best Friend's Wedding which got a PG-13 due to appeal).

The only two words to give a film an automatic R are probably the two dreaded "c" words. The one that ends in "-sucker" and the other one that ends in the two letters "nt."

 

[JeremyErwin]

In the Gosford Park commentary (41:28):, Robert Altman explains that you need "eight to twelve fucks" for a guaranteed 'R'. Four will get a "PG rating".

"And we did that on purpose, just to be sure to get an 'R' rating, because I didn't want fourteen year old boys coming off the street to see this film, because they wouldn't like it."

 

[Jonathan Kaye]

At some point, the adult watching the film has to take responsibility for who is watching it.

As has been mentioned above, here in the UK all bonus features are rated, and the overall rating of the package reflects the highest rating of the whole package.

To be honest, I suspect most people don't really look at the rating when buying something...

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

Does anyone listen when someone says something here anymore?

I already explained what happened when they showed up. Guy's, i'm not some irresponsable adult blissfully showing Saving Private Ryan to a 5 year old, it was just AVP for crying out loud. His kid plays X-Box games that are scarier than this film is.

Also, IT WAS JUST A THOUGHT, an idea, something to kick around, where would the world be without brain storming new ideas? Despite what one may think, DVD can be improved on and changes can be made, and I still think that a simple warning on the commentary selection screen would be a good idea, and Colin's above Flight of the Phoenix example only enforces that.

And i'll repeat again, I would have turned the movie off if I knew that it may contain language that my friend may not want to let his son hear.

I guess it comes down to the question, just because the word pussy is used seemingly everywhere, does that make it alright and would I want my child, if I had one, hearing that word all the time? I mean I realize that their are worse words, but it's still not a good word to use, I think we can agree on that can't we? I hope so, I would hate to imagine a world where the word pussy becomes a socially acceptable term.

I get it alright, most of you think i'm off base with this concept and that's alright, but it's just an idea.

Bill,
regarding Gieger's work, I can see that in his paintings, however in the films they are portrayed as being just scary, vicious monsters. I never associated sex with the aliens in the films, ever.

Jonathan,
your right with that last line, I really think that people just buy the film without even thinking about the rating.

As a sidebar, personally, I feel that a good film is a good film, for example, my brother seems to be under the impression that a good horror film has to be rated R, as if the gore factor determins what good horror is, when in actuality a PG-13 horror film can scare the pants off of you if it does it's job, The Grudge is a prime example.

But anyway...

 

[DavidofLondon]

Anyone who's read H.R. Giger's comments on the original Alien movie will know the entire design of the Alien monster was supposed to be deliberately sexual.

The face huggers are supposed the look like vaginas. Another example being the way the inner mouth part pushes out with teeth from inside the mouth.

Giger felt that by using these sexual stereotypes he made the creature scarier by addressing men's hidden fears about women and sexuality.

But to the topic at hand, personally I'm opposed to ANY form of censorship. Censorship is always, IMHO, about someone telling you that you shouldn't watch something they find offensive. I never gave anyone the right to decide that for me.

By all means improve labelling on DVDs (although keep it tidy I don't want my DVD covered with warnings) so people can make informed decisions before they watch things. But lets not censor what people say.

 

[Mark Bendiksen]

If the film is one that could be easily categorized as a "family film" (no, I don't think AvP fits into that category) then I tend to think that the supplemental material should be family friendly as well. In my mind that's not censorship, it's just common sense. For instance, my family and I should be able to listen to the Julie Andrews/Dick Van Dyke commentary on Mary Poppins without worrying about the F-bomb being dropped. If, on the other hand, the movie is not a family film then I think all bets are off. That being said, I think if the commentary is going to include excessive language (or "pervasive" as the MPAA likes to call it) then I think it would be nice to have a brief warning of some sort.

Just my $.02.

 

[BrettB]

I think we should have ratings in thread titles. I never expected this kind of raunch in a John Williamson thread.

 

[Will_B]

I don't like seeing warnings before my film starts. Lately, films I've bought on DVD start with a green screen and an MPAA advisory saying "This film has been rated PG13 for brief violence" or whatnot.

And this ruins part of the film for me. It ruins the film because it informs me, like a spoiler, that I won't be seeing Keira Knightly's titties.

I want to discover that on my own. I want to hold out hope that I might. But this MPAA bs ruins it by spoiling in advance details of the film.

I am fine with the rating being typed on the back of the DVD's cover art in small type. BUT I DO NOT WANT IT SHOWN BEFORE THE FILM STARTS!

It used to be semi-ok, when the rating did not include their reasons (i.e. rated R - but why? oh, because of "brief scene of domestic violence" -- thanks MPAA for ruining a plot point there, thanks a lot, 'wipes).

 

[Holadem]

I wholseheartedly second this, and I would remove the smiley.

--
H

 

[Damin J Toell]

So why wasn't the film's PG-13 rating alone enough to have you turn off the film when a 7-year old walks in? While listening to a commentary, the PG-13 visuals were still on the screen, and commentary tracks often have large chunks of the dialogue audible. Surely it also isn't a big leap to think that a PG-13 film will have a PG-13-style commentary (which this appears to be, from your description). If those things weren't even enough to get you to turn it off, would an addition warning really have helped? How many times do you need to be reminded that the movie is inappropriate for a 7-year old?

DJ

 

[JeremyErwin]

Never seen the movie. I have, however, noticed that the script contains several instances of the "f-word," though not nearly as many as "Scarface."

 

[Sean Richardson]

Jeremy - the movie was written (and to some extent conceived, by what Anderson has said) as an R-rated movie before the studio backed off of it. By most accounts, the studio never let him shoot the R-rated material. I assume the language was fixed.

I'd support some sort of optional censoring of DVD commentaries, like a feature that would just *bleep* out potentially offensive words, as long as it was just an option on the disc; I don't want the commentaries to be fully censored. [I have the R2 'Time Bandits' for the extras, but just knowing there's a censored bit on the commentary bugs me a little.]

But I believe the reason they don't bother with this is that children are regarded -- in a general sort of way, right or wrong -- as not being interested in commentary tracks.

 

[Ruz-El]

This thread is just more proof that ratings don't work. Look at the packageing for AvsP : features a monster on the front, with the title alluding to violence between said monster and some other entity. What about this makes it seem like it would be appropriate to 7-8 year old, and why are you surprised to hear an objectional word in a commentary? Everything about the title and presentation, including the genre of movie that it is (Sci-Fi horror, not the Shit genre that the movie ultimatly fills)suggest that it might contain something objectional, wheither language, violece, visual or subjective is irrelevant. all of this is beside the PG-13 rating. 20th Century fox should put more warnings on a DVD because a kid might accidently walk in and hear pussy, because the guardians of said kid are busy bullshitting and not paying attention to the flick or the kid? Am I the only one shocked by this thread?

No offense, but nothing is going to prevent kids or anyone from accidently seeing something they shouldn't see, ratings or no ratings. It is the responsibility of the manufacturers of the entertainment to present there product accuratly, and for the purchasers of that product be resposible for the presentation of that material in their homes. I think you well find that via cover art, titles of films, and the descriptions of plot on 99% of DVD's out on the market show you what you are going to get (floating heads! ) so there really shouldn't be any surprise by anything on any of these dvd's.

 

[Ruz-El]

Oh yeah, I don't support any form of censoring, PERIOD! No good has ever come from it.

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

So who the hell is talking about "censorship"? Anybody here own a dictionary? Try looking it up. If the government isn't preventing material from being distributed entirely or isn't cutting parts out of it, there is no censorship. Ratings systems are not censorship. FCC regulation of the public airwaves which are licensed to broadcasters is not censorship. A store refusing to carry certain products is not censorship (since said products are still available at the store down the street.)

Words mean things and communication is not helped in any way when people start throwing words around in a wildly exaggerated fashion that ultimately robs them of meaning.

Regards,

Joe

 

[Will_B]

Joe you're arguing semantics. Call it by a different name if you want to be grammatically correct. But the word has already been robbed of the meaning originally intended. Back in the days of yore when the most powerful entities on earth were governments, the word censorship was used in the context of governments. Now that companies are the most powerful entitues on earth, the word is used in the context of companies. Maybe the dictionary should be updated, because people aren't going to start changing the way they speak about censorship just because technically it isn't adhering to what the word once meant.

For the purposes of this discussion, just imagine people are saying "editing" when they say "censoring."

That the film being used an an example features numerous people being killed in horrific ways by monsters makes the complaint about the word pussy -- which was used in Predator 2 in the famous line about "pussy face" -- seem on its face to be ridiculous. But as I recall someone also noticed that on one of the Star Wars prequels there are some rude words used when a set got destroyed by weather. Because that film was geared to children, the frank commentary track was a bit out of place, IMO.

Perhaps studios should try to match the tone of the commentary to the tone of the film.

But the danger with that is, it assumes the studios know who their audiences is. And that is clearly not always true, as when the Fox animation department thought that children are the ones who buy the animated Batman series.

Personally I appreciate frank language on commentary tracks. Shows a level of trust with the audience.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

Damin made a great point with this comment which was basically also said in a prior post about the fact that one should be able to expect that a family friendly film would contain a family friendly commentary.

AVP is a PG-13 movie, so why give it a G-rated commentary track?

Plus, as someone else also mentioned there is an asumption rightly or wrongly that the people listening to commentary tracks are adults, and that kids generally aren't interested in such things.
That may or may not be correct, but that's how the studios see it and honestly that's what I would've said if you had asked me who I thought was more likely to want to listen to a commentary or hell even watch a documentary.

Would ratings be helpful, maybe but they are not necessary if a degree of common sense is applied.

Although this thread did remind me that the F-word appeared but was bleeped out in the commentary track for Finding Nemo.

So I agree, I don't think extra warnings or ratings for bonus material is necessary.

 

[Kenneth Bova]

Say for instance that commentaries were indeed rated buy the MPAA. Is this one word enough to rate the commentary as R? If this is the worst word on the track, then wouldn't the rating of the film with commentary still be PG-13 (considering that visuals are taken into consideration as well as dialog/discussion)? Wouldn't this lead to exactly the same response from people who object to the things said? The film is PG-13. I certainly wouldn't expect the commentary to be PG or G as the bullets fly.