Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings?

[ambelamba]

I think I read about if a few years ago. I think it was either Playboy or Penthouse. The article criticized then alive Jack Valenti for making movie ratings strict.

Recently I rented Logan's Run and Clash of the Titans. You know, it was a good time when we could see some T&A (as long as they are not shown in sexual situation) on PG movies. COTT had a breastfeeding scene. Logan's Run had the T&A shot of Jenny Aguiter(sp?). It was a good time.

As far as I can remember, the article claimed that without Jack Valenti we could have had full frontal nude on PG-13 movies. The article blamed him for restricting the freedom of expression, I mean...nudity.

But I guess the real blame goes to Ronald Reagan and his conservative Republicans...

EDIT:Oh, I should have done the research. The bastard Valenti INVENTED the MPAA rating system!

You know, I am not against nudity on PG movies as long as they are not bumping the uglies on screen. There can be plenty of nudity on screen without sexual situations. Americans are so uptight about nudity. How sad...

If the article was right and we had no influences from Jack Valenti, we could have nudity in PG and PG-13 movies, full-frontal, male or female. If this was what happened I wonder how this affected Trek movies. I am really curious about that.

 

[AdmiralGarak]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

It would have affected Trek very little. Trek has always been geared as family friendly entertainment. I really doubt anybody would have tried to put full frontal nudity in a Trek film.

 

[pookha]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

it could be much worse.
they could still be using the hayes standards.

 

[ambelamba]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

It would have affected Trek very little. Trek has always been geared as family friendly entertainment. I really doubt anybody would have tried to put full frontal nudity in a Trek film.

Oh, well. I would.

I've been thinking about writing a trilogy of fan-script for years. I couldn't put down anything because I had no idea how I should make a story based on the total destruction of the Federation in 25th century.

I wanted to make the story with PG-13 level everything, but browsing through this TrekBBS made me change that option. Now I decided to make the level of violence on par with Wanted, Blade 2, and Saving Private Ryan combined. And the level of sexuality on par with Dreamers (starring Eva Green), Uncensored version of Eyes Wide Shut, Salvador, and almost Lust, Caution.

 

[smeos]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

We have it backwards over here. Nudity and language are no no's, but violence is A-okay!

There's a great documentary about the MPAA called 'This Film is Not Yet Rated', that shows what a bunch of hypocrites they are.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

ambelamba, we have other fora to discuss these things. Moving to TV & Media (I'll leave a redirect).

 

[Small White Car]

Basically, Valenti's system sucks, but it saved us from government restrictions which would have sucked even more.

So is he a hero or a villain? Can you applaud someone who hurts you in a way that saves you from even worse pain?

I'm not sure I can answer those questions, but that's the issue, more or less.

 

[Paxil]

Basically, Valenti's system sucks, but it saved us from government restrictions which would have sucked even more.

Not really. Government restrictions could have been constitutionally challenged.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

What's wrong with having full frontal nudity in NC-17 movies? The ratings simply provide information. What's wrong with that? It's up to the individual to decide what use they put that information to, which is as it should be. I don't at all mind knowing what rating a movie has, but there's no rating that will stop me from seeing a movie I otherwise have decided to see.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

It would have affected Trek very little. Trek has always been geared as family friendly entertainment. I really doubt anybody would have tried to put full frontal nudity in a Trek film.

Oh, well. I would.

I've been thinking about writing a trilogy of fan-script for years. I couldn't put down anything because I had no idea how I should make a story based on the total destruction of the Federation in 25th century.

I wanted to make the story with PG-13 level everything, but browsing through this TrekBBS made me change that option. Now I decided to make the level of violence on par with Wanted, Blade 2, and Saving Private Ryan combined. And the level of sexuality on par with Dreamers (starring Eva Green), Uncensored version of Eyes Wide Shut, Salvador, and almost Lust, Caution.

Sounds like what you have is definitely not Star Trek. Nothing wrong with that. Invent another space opera universe and go for it. I could even suggest several actors for your butt-nekked scenes...Michael Trucco, Ben Browder, Joe Flanigan, Naveen Edwards, Josh Holloway, Connor Trinneer, Christopher Judge...but be warned, I want a guaranteed NC-17 rating before I plunk down my latinum!

And rest assured, Hollywood benefits from the rating system because it actually draws audience to a movie. They are not poor little victims suffering "government censorship."

G = parents get the assurance they can take their young children; PG-13 or R = assurance to teenagers of the relevant ages that they will be seeing something grownup and "cool" and not for kids. So far the poor NC-17 rating has languished because apparently there are few people who are attracted to movies that promise to go beyond R, but are not just porn.

 

[Kegek]

What's wrong with having full frontal nudity in NC-17 movies? The ratings simply provide information. What's wrong with that? It's up to the individual to decide what use they put that information to, which is as it should be. I don't at all mind knowing what rating a movie has, but there's no rating that will stop me from seeing a movie I otherwise have decided to see.

That'd be my stance as well. Ratings systems that prevent films from being seen based on their criteria (such as the Hayes Code, which prohibited among other things 'miscegenation' - interracial mixing) aren't that helpful. Ratings which indicate what kind of content is in the film, however, are.

It's true that in turn effects how films are made. On one end of the spectrum you have the Star Trek franchise resting safely with mainly the PG rating, and slasher films which covet higher ratings to boost sales. That's just moviemaking, though.

It's also true it'd be indicative of American culture. Kirikou and the Soceress is a very charming children's film, but this French animated feature, with its ethnographic nudity of tribal Africans, was never likely to make a splash in the US (or the director Ocelot's more recent Azur & Asmar, which has a scene of breastfeeding). The same is true in the rest of the world - Michael Collins got a lower rating here in Ireland than in the US, largely due to its subject matter.

Still, ratings should indicate what's within a film, and it's then up to our judgement as to whether to watch it or let children watch it. Seems only sensible to me.

 

[auntiehill]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

Sounds like what you have is definitely not Star Trek. Nothing wrong with that. Invent another space opera universe and go for it. I could even suggest several actors for your butt-nekked scenes...Michael Trucco, Ben Browder, Joe Flanigan, Naveen Edwards, Josh Holloway, Connor Trinneer, Christopher Judge...but be warned, I want a guaranteed NC-17 rating before I plunk down my latinum!

Naveen ANDREWS. And yes, I'd pay good money for that, too.

 

[Small White Car]

The ratings simply provide information. What's wrong with that?

Simply information? That's funny, because the DEFINITION of NC-17 is that anyone under 17 can not be admitted.

but there's no rating that will stop me from seeing a movie I otherwise have decided to see.

So what is it? Do you like the NC-17 rating, or do you prefer a system that informs but does not restrict? You can't say you like both. That doesn't make any sense.

 

[Christopher]

Recently I rented Logan's Run and Clash of the Titans. You know, it was a good time when we could see some T&A (as long as they are not shown in sexual situation) on PG movies. COTT had a breastfeeding scene. Logan's Run had the T&A shot of Jenny Aguiter(sp?). It was a good time.

In high school, I actually got shown Clash of the Titans in one of my classes, as well as Zefirelli's Romeo and Juliet with Olivia Hussey's nude scene. I guess it was considered okay because it was artistic.

As far as I can remember, the article claimed that without Jack Valenti we could have had full frontal nude on PG-13 movies. The article blamed him for restricting the freedom of expression, I mean...nudity.

I don't know if that's so. As I recall, the PG-13 rating was created to allow filmmakers to go farther than they could in PG movies without getting the more box-office-unfriendly R rating slapped on. It was intended to broaden their creative expression, not to narrow it.

Although ratings often end up having an effect that's different from their intent. For instance, the NC-17 rating was created in order to have a category for classy adult films that was free of the "porno" stigma. Unfortunately, the stigma came from the society, not the label, so the new label just inherited the exact same stigma. I think maybe what happened with PG-13 was that it ended up taking the place of old PG, while PG itself became milder.

If the article was right and we had no influences from Jack Valenti, we could have nudity in PG and PG-13 movies, full-frontal, male or female.

I don't think that's true at all. It was Valenti's creation of the ratings system that opened the door for there to be nudity in movies at all, I think. Before then, we had the Hayes Code, which required all movies to conform to the same standards of censorship. The MPAA system was intended to allow filmmakers the freedom to do whatever they wanted free of censorship, by providing "safe" categories for adult movies that would be clearly labeled as inappropriate for children (or for squeamish adults).

Of course, government censorship was just replaced by the censorship of the marketplace. Theaters don't like showing G- or R-rated movies because they don't sell as many tickets as PG or PG-13 movies, and they generally refuse to show NC-17 movies at all. So that puts pressure on filmmakers to adjust their films to fit the more coveted ratings, whether by cutting adult material out of what should be an R-rated (or NC-17-rated) film to earn a milder rating, or by adding gratuitous profanity to turn a properly G-rated movie into PG. It's more the abuse of the ratings system, rather than its design, that's led to restrictions on content. Although the current MPAA members don't help much with their often very arbitrary standards (such as basing their decisions on whether there are two uses of the S-word in a scene or only one).

It would have affected Trek very little. Trek has always been geared as family friendly entertainment. I really doubt anybody would have tried to put full frontal nudity in a Trek film.

Gene Roddenberry sure as hell would have. The only non-Trek feature film he produced and wrote, the Roger Vadim-directed Pretty Maids All in a Row, was a dark sex comedy which was one of the first mainstream movies to have frontal female nudity after the MPAA ratings system allowing it was created. The original Star Trek was very adult by '60s standards, always pushing the envelope, getting away with as much skin and sexual content as it could possibly slip past the censors. Vulcan mating frenzy, interracial kissing, an alien princess taking men as breeding stock and implicitly actually having sex with Kirk between scenes, discussions of contraception as a means of population control... this was very adult stuff for its day. It wasn't until later that TOS got a reputation as a family show, thanks to constant daytime reruns and the animated series (I suppose). That led Paramount to insist that TMP be a G-rated movie, forcing Roddenberry to leave out all the stuff about Deltan sexuality he intended the film to contain (though he sure as hell put it in the novel).

And TNG also started out very sexy, with Data being "fully functional" with Tasha, nude Betazoid weddings, the planet of the blonde hedonists, etc. But it too got pushed into the "family" mold once it became successful and respectable (and once Roddenberry's influence on the writing diminished).

 

[ambelamba]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

Sounds like what you have is definitely not Star Trek. Nothing wrong with that. Invent another space opera universe and go for it. I could even suggest several actors for your butt-nekked scenes...Michael Trucco, Ben Browder, Joe Flanigan, Naveen Edwards, Josh Holloway, Connor Trinneer, Christopher Judge...but be warned, I want a guaranteed NC-17 rating before I plunk down my latinum!

Oh, well. Why not?

Roddenberry wanted to push the envelop. If the R-rating wasn't much of a box-office repellent and Roddenberry IS still alive, he would have pushed for some R-rated (not for graphic violence, but for some nudity and sensuality) Trek movies.

 

[TGTheodore]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

The ratings are in no way legally required or binding. A producer doesn't have to submit his/her movie for a rating, nor do theaters have to enforce the movies that DO get ratings.

It's just that some groups of idiots ostracize producers and theaters if they DON'T follow the ratings system.

--Ted

 

[Hermiod]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

It would have affected Trek very little. Trek has always been geared as family friendly entertainment. I really doubt anybody would have tried to put full frontal nudity in a Trek film.

The worst we ever got was a bit of swearing and a very, very PG sex scene in Nemesis.

If they had tried to censor Star Trek for the boundaries it did push (i.e. Kirk and Uhura's kiss) by enforcing a higher rating I'd be very angry about it and I imagine I wouldn't be the only one.

 

[Roshi]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

Sounds like what you have is definitely not Star Trek. Nothing wrong with that. Invent another space opera universe and go for it. I could even suggest several actors for your butt-nekked scenes...Michael Trucco, Ben Browder, Joe Flanigan, Naveen Edwards, Josh Holloway, Connor Trinneer, Christopher Judge...but be warned, I want a guaranteed NC-17 rating before I plunk down my latinum!

Naveen ANDREWS. And yes, I'd pay good money for that, too.

Excellent! We have a wee bit of two of the most active females of the board sharing their fantasies!
Bless you, girls!

 

[Christopher]

Re: [OFF TOPIC] Was Jack Valenti responsible for current movie ratings

The ratings are in no way legally required or binding. A producer doesn't have to submit his/her movie for a rating, nor do theaters have to enforce the movies that DO get ratings.

It's just that some groups of idiots ostracize producers and theaters if they DON'T follow the ratings system.

On the other hand, there seems to be quite an active market in unrated "director's cut" DVDs or direct-to-DVD movies. So it only seems to affect theaters and not home viewing.