In Contention

Tag: MPAA

  • ‘Blue Valentine’ wins ratings appeal, ‘King’s Speech’ loses

    It’s justice for “Blue Valentine” today as Harvey Weinstein’s appeal of the MPAA’s NC-17 rating has gone through, allowing for the film to receive an R and continue to reap the benefits of this publicity in the industry.  Weinstein showed up personally (a first) to argue the decision and the board overturned its original rating.

    But he was one-and-one, as “The King’s Speech,” which had been rated R for language (specifically a scene in which Colin Firth spouts of the f-word continuously as part of his character’s speech impediment therapy), will not be getting the preferred PG-13.

    I’m really stoked this went through for Derek Cianfrance and company, though.  It came on the heels of a number of stories concerning double standards with perceptions of oral sex in films like “Blue Valentine” and “Black Swan,” and actor Ryan Gosling has certainly been vocal about his feelings on the matter.  The pressure was on, and rightly so.  All is well.

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  • Weinstein lawyers up on MPAA

    Well, we all knew Harvey Weinstein wasn’t going to take that head-scratching (and commercially damaging) ‘NC-17’ rating for “Blue Valentine” lying down. (While still generating maximum publicity from the unfortunate situation, natch.) The Weinstein Company today announced that it has gathered “a formidable legal team” to challenge the MPAA’s decision — and while they’re about it, they’re contesting that ‘R’ rating for “The King’s Speech” too.

    And Weinstein’s lawyers mean business: Bert Fields, the attorney overseeing the “Valentine” appeal, goes so far as to say the extreme age restriction “violates [the company’s] right to freedom of speech under the state and US constitution.” Alongside the legal speak, the press release issued today by TWC also includes this heartfelt, well-reasoned plea from star Michelle Williams:

    The MPAA’s decision on Blue Valentine unmasks a taboo in our culture, that an honest portrayal of a relationship is more threatening than a sensationalized one… Mainstream films often depict sex and violence in a manner that is disturbing and very far from reality. Yet, the MPAA regularly awards these films with a more audience friendly rating, enabling our culture’s desensitization to violence, rape, torture and brutality. Our film does not depict any of these attributes. It’s simply a candid look at the difficulties couples face in sustaining their relationships over time. Blue Valentine opens a door for couples to have a dialogue about the everyday realities of many relationships. This film was made in the spirit of love, honesty and intimacy. I hope that the MPAA will hear our pleas and reconsider their decision.

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  • 11/17 OSCARWEB ROUND-UP: The death of Oscar bait, ‘How Do You Know’ nails a PG-13, Moore and Levi on ‘Tangled’

    • Guest blogging for Nathaniel Rogers, Michael C. writes up the apparent death of “Oscar bait” as it pertains to Best Picture winners. [The Film Experience]

    • Steve Pond chats with “The Kids Are All Right” writer/director Lisa Cholodenko. [The Odds]

    • James Cameron discusses his inspiration for “Avatar” (it won’t go away) in an extended collector’s edition clip. [MTV Movies Blog]

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  • 11/12 OSCARWEB ROUND-UP: ‘Burlesque’ brouhaha, ‘How Do You Know’ concedes cuts for PG-13, box office and Oscar

    • Anthony D’Alessandro on how box office impacts Oscar players. [Thompson on Hollywood]

    • Kim Masters writes up the juicy story of on-set fighting that marked the production of “Burlesque.” [Hollywood Reporter]

    • Christy Grosz on awards season buzz momentum built on the festival circuit. [The Envelope]

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  • ‘Dagenham’ producer protests ‘R’ rating

    The delicate folks at the MPAA have come in for a right old bollocking in the past few weeks, and deservedly so. First came the furore over the baffling ‘NC-17’ rating they awarded “Blue Valentine” — a lemon of a situation that Harvey Weinstein, to judge from the steamy poster unveiled yesterday, has decided to make into lemonade.

    Another of Weinstein’s babies, “The King’s Speech,” also got the brunt of the ratings board’s conservatism when it was slapped with an ‘R’ for a brief torrent of narratively contextualized four-letter words — despite having a fair claim to being the most mild-mannered prestige drama of the year.

    We all know that bad things, like Kardashian sisters, come in threes, so we didn’t have long to wait before the next eruption over MPAA idiocy, and once more, the film at the center of it is a calculatedly inoffensive true-life Britpic. Despite having the kind of cheery inspirational message that young girls and their grandmothers alike can appreciate, feminist dramedy “Made in Dagenham” has received an ‘R’ rating for “language and brief sexuality,” referring respectively to a scattering of f-words and some gentle, clothed innuendo.

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  • 11/9 OSCARWEB ROUND-UP: Screenwriting hopefuls, Hooper on fugly ‘King’s Speech’ poster, MPAA shamed

    • Sasha Stone on the season’s screenwriting contenders. [Awards Daily]

    • “The King’s Speech” director Tom Hooper also hates the poster everyone has been knocking. [Movieline]

    • David Poland split screens “The Social Network” star Armie Hammer. [The Hot Blog]

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  • ‘King’s Speech’ told to mind its language

    Admittedly, this isn’t much of a story, but following last week’s furore over the NC-17 certificate handed to the starkly adult marital drama “Blue Valentine,” it’s amusing to see a rather more milquetoast Oscar hopeful having its own trouble with the ratings board.

    London’s Evening Standard paper reports that “The King’s Speech,” already rated R by the MPAA, has been given a 15 rating (permitting no viewers under that age) by the British censors — not a severe rating, but more restrictive than one might expect for a polite period biopic revolving around speech therapy.

    The reason for the adult rating is the same on both sides of the Atlantic: a short comic scene where Colin Firth’s stuttering King George VI is required to say “fuck” 42 times in quick succession as part of a therapeutic exercise. To be frank, 14 year-olds were unlikely to be queueing around the block to see “The King’s Speech” in the first place, but that’s not really the point: R or 15 ratings could wrongfoot mild-mannered mature viewers who otherwise sit squarely in the film’s sights.

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  • THE LISTS: Top 10 NC-17 rated films

    Amid the recent kerfuffle over the Motion Picture Association of America’s curious decision to slap Derek Cianfrance’s sensitive marital drama (and Oscar hopeful) “Blue Valentine” with a commercially inhibiting NC-17 certificate, I failed to note that the MPAA’s most drastic rating celebrated rather a significant anniversary last week.

    October 5 made it 20 years since Philip Kaufman’s sexually explicit literary biopic “Henry & June,” the first film ever to be given the NC-17 classification, opened in US theaters.

    Like “Blue Valentine,” Kaufman’s film was a high-end prestige item aiming for critical kudos and even a shot at year-end awards (indeed, it did wind up nabbing a solitary Oscar bid) that the sage folks on the ratings board nonetheless deemed a little too adult for the adults.

    For decades before then, the X rating (now defunct, but still prevalent in everyday speech) had been their standby for such films — of which one, “Midnight Cowboy,” managed to override the X-rated stigma to win the Best Picture Oscar — but had since become too closely associated with grimy pornographic material.

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  • MPAA burns ‘Blue Valentine’ with NC-17 rating

    As if Derek Cianfrance’s moving, bruising marital drama “Blue Valentine” — with its Oscar-caliber performances by Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams — didn’t face enough obstacles heading into the awards season, what with its bleak subject matter and perilously late release date, the MPAA has just thrown it an extra curveball. In their wisdom, the sensitive souls on the ratings board have ludicrously given the film an NC-17 rating: the movie-censorship equivalent of a scarlet letter, theoretically reserved for films that feature extreme, boundary-pushing violence or sexual content.

    It’s been almost five months since I saw “Blue Valentine,” so my memory may be a little hazy, but I must profess to being absolutely stumped as to what content in the film could have provoked this decision. It’s a harsh, adult-oriented drama, make no mistake, but it doesn’t even feature explicit nudity, much less any beyond-the-pale activity. Deadline’s Mike Fleming claims this was the scene that supposedly crossed the line [mild spoiler alert]:

    I’m told the rating was given for a scene in which the characters played by Gosling and Williams try to save their crumbling marriage by spending a night away in a hotel. They get drunk and their problems intensify when he wants to have sex and she doesn’t, but will to get him off her back.

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  • 12/14 Oscarweb Round-up

    George Clooney in Up in the Air• In case you missed this morning’s announcement, “Inglourious Basterds” and “Nine” led the field of BFCA nominees. [In Contention]

    • Frank Rich op-eds a love letter to “Up in the Air.” [New York Times]

    • Steve Pond painstakingly assembles a primer on how many votes a contender needs for an Oscar nomination per category. [The Odds]

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  • How the hell did ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ get an ‘R’ rating from the MPAA?

    The Hollywood Reporter revealed today that “Slumdog Millionaire” has received an “R” rating from the MPAA, and I’m frankly stunned.  Considering the stuff that passes for PG-13 nowadays, and despite the violence in the film (which is tense but rarely frightening or graphic), I thought for sure the film had an easy road to a more accessible rating.

    Shocked.  More later, when I have time to be properly pissed about this.